Markéta Kabůrková

14 Tela Ignea Satanae:

Christian Scholars and the Editing of
Hebrew Polemical Literature
Anti-Christian polemics represented a relatively significant literary genre with-
in Jewish literature. The first Jewish critiques of Christianity appeared in Eu-
rope at the end of the twelfth century. From that period until the modern era,
dozens of such polemical books were produced and read both in the Ashkenazi
and Sephardi milieus. These books circulated as manuscripts, a method of dis-
semination that continued long after the invention of the printing press, in
spite of the fact that the new technology was otherwise widely embraced with-
in the Jewish intellectual environment.1
In fact, it was Christians who began editing and printing this literature,
thereby playing an instrumental role in preserving these works up to the
present time. There were only a small number of Jewish polemics that were
printed by Jews in Hebrew before being reprinted by Christians, often accom-
panied by critical responses. The first was Joseph Albo’s Sefer ‛Iqarim (Princi-
ples of Faith), printed in 1485, in which the section devoted to the refutation of
Christian doctrines comprised only two chapters (25 and 26 in part III)2 of a
four-volume compilation that attempted to present a complete overview of Jew-
ish beliefs; in later editions, these chapters was often censored or entirely ex-
punged.3 Despite being written a short time before the expulsion of the Jews
from Spain, the second treatise, Abraham Bibago’s Derech ’Emunah (The Path
of Faith), with a fifth chapter that included a critique of Christianity, was only
printed in Constantinople in 1521.4 In this regard, it is worth noting that the

1 The first dated incunabula were Rashi’s commentary on the Pentateuch and Jacob ben Ash-
er’s ’Arba‛ah Ṭurim of 1475. This new invention was called the “crown of all science”, and its
practice, like that of writing sacred books, “a divine craft” (mele’chet šamayim; Babylonian
Talmud, tractate ‛Eruvin 13a), or “sacred craft” (mele’chet ha-qodeš; Exodus 36. 4). It was seen
as a means of realizing Isaiah’s prediction (Isaiah 11. 9) that “the earth shall be full of the
knowledge of the Lord”.
2 For the Hebrew-English edition prepared by Isaac Husik, see Albo 1946, vol. 3, 217–245.
3 Trautner-Kromann 1993, 170.
4 For a modern Hebrew edition with an introduction prepared by Chava Fraenkel-Goldsmith,
see Bibago 1978.

Note: This research was supported by the Czech Science Foundation (GA ČR standard
project, no. 14–19686S).

DOI 10.1515/9783110524345-020

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Ottoman Empire represented an important centre of Jewish printing, and that

conditions there were different than those in the Christian realm in Europe.
This article focuses on the work of two Lutheran Hebraists involved in the
publication of Hebrew anti-Christian polemical literature: Theodor Hackspan
(1607–1659) and Johann Christoph Wagenseil (1633–1705), both active at the
University of Altdorf, in the Nuremberg area.5 This institute was established in
1578 and received university privileges in 1622. Teaching Hebrew was part of
the curriculum from the outset, and the university quickly became one of the
main centres of Hebrew studies in early modern Christian Europe. In 1644,
while working at this institute, Hackspan published Rabbi Yom-Tov Lipmann
Mühlhausen’s Sefer ha-Niẓẓaḥon.6 The text, written c. 1399–1409,7 is divided
into 354 sections to be studied on a daily basis according to the lunar calendar.
Formally, it is an exegetical compendium with numerous excurses into aggadic
stories, philosophical polemics of a Sephardi style, and descriptions of popular
religious practices. It also includes arguments against Karaism and is perceived
in recent scholarship to be focused more on a critique of Jewish converts to
Christianity than on Christianity itself.8 For his part, in 1681, Wagenseil pre-
pared a bilingual edition of selected Hebrew texts called Tela Ignea Satanae.
These two books represented the first published examples of anti-Christian po-
lemical literature written in Hebrew, and it was no coincidence that these print-
ed editions were the work of Christian Hebraists. While the motives behind the
Christian interest in Hebrew polemical literature might have differed from one
scholar to another, they always reflected Christian standards and expectations.
Christian Hebraists dealing with medieval Jewish polemics, most of whom were
German Protestants,9 were university professors who were obliged by law,
oath, and conscience to defend the Christian confession of their state.
By making a selection of Jewish polemical texts available, Hackspan and
Wagenseil added new elements to the Reformation-era discussion of Jews and

5 Moran 1973, 1.
6 On Mühlhausen (also spelt Mülhausen and Muelhausen), see Breuer and Guggenheim 2003,
vol. 3, 1129–1131; Kaufmann 1927; Walfish 1993, 9–37; Limor and Yuval 2004.
7 The terminus ante quem is 1409, because of a messianic calculation for the year 1410 includ-
ed in the book (paragraph 335). There is proof of Rabbi Lipmann’s residency in Prague for the
years 1407 and 1413; Breuer argued that Kraków was the place of origin; see Breuer and Gug-
genheim 2003, 1129.
8 Limor and Yuval 2004, 161–176.
9 The circle of Christian experts in Jewish polemical literature was small; besides Hackspan
and Wagenseil, it included, for example, Paul Fagius, Sebastian Münster, Wilhelm Schickard,
and Johannes Buxtorf the Elder. The only important Catholic Hebraists who worked with Jew-
ish polemical writings were Gilbert Génébrard and Jean Mercier, although the latter was proba-
bly a secret Protestant.

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 Tela Ignea Satanae 263

Judaism. Furthermore, as the authors of “Jewish ethnographies”,10 they played

a role in revealing aspects of Jewish life and culture that the Jews would have
preferred to keep to themselves. In the edition of the Hebrew Gospel, its author
wrote that until that time, the text had been “hidden in their [i.e. Jewish] cellars
and is now at last brought forth from the midst of their inner chambers and
from darkness”,11 We can discern an analogous approach in the endeavours of
the Christian editors and publishers of Jewish polemical literature. In a sense,
they strived to expropriate Jewish texts from their original cultural setting and
use them to meet Christian needs.
The characteristic feature of the Reformation, as the name of the movement
itself indicates, was an attempt to return to the roots of Christianity. The quest
for the original tradition, understood as contrasting sharply with the distorted
picture that the Roman Catholicism of the day offered, consisted in large part
of a return to the original sources written in original languages, which, in addi-
tion to the Greek of the New Testament, included Hebrew and Aramaic.
Beginning with Jerome, continuing through the Middle Ages, and carrying
on into the early stage of the Reformation era,12 Christians were dependent on
Jewish assistance to access Hebrew texts. When a medieval Christian scholar
wanted to read the Hebrew Bible in the original, he usually had to contact a
local Jew who was willing to guide him. Jewish converts often served as inter-
mediaries in matters of linguistic knowledge and post-biblical Jewish litera-
ture. It was not always the case that these two aspects of the encounter with
the Hebrew tradition were by necessity connected. A number of Christian theo-
logians whose knowledge was acquired solely through conversation with their
Jewish contemporaries, without any independent access to the Hebrew lan-
guage, wrote exegetical works that showed the marked influence of rabbinic
commentaries.13 Michael A. Signer classifies these authors as “cultural Hebra-
ists”, in contrast to the less numerous “lexical Hebraists” with an actual com-
mand of the language.14 We can join Aryeh Grabois in understanding this “cul-
tural Hebraism” as a manifestation of medieval philosemitism that imagined
an “open-minded society of intellectuals”, in which “the foundation of the

10 Hsia 1994, 223–236.

11 This phrase appeared in a subtitle of a version of Hebrew Matthew published by Jean du
Tillet and Jean Mercier (Paris, 1555). They prepared their edition on the basis of one of the
books confiscated from the Roman Jews under papal degree in 1553. Horbury 1999, 125; Howard
1995, 161. On the motive of secrecy, see Carlebach 1996.
12 For some remarks on the dating, see Burnett 2012, 7.
13 Smalley 1964.
14 Signer 2004, 22–23.

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264 Markéta Kabůrková

common monotheistic faith and possession of the same sacred books created
[…] a feeling of a spiritual brotherhood, uniting the learned society of both
Jews and Christians”,15 or we can re-evaluate the context of this cultural inter-
change. Amos Funkelstein critically defines the approach taken by Grabois as
an idyllic cliché of “learned men”.16 It is no coincidence that the Christian
interest in Hebrew sources was rarely devoid of polemical intentions; it was
the Dominicans – an order devoted to spreading the faith and fighting heresy –
who established Studia linguarum as an indispensable means for their mis-
sion.17
In cases of religious controversy, an adversary’s canonical sources are of-
ten both criticized and exploited. The approach adopted by Pablo Christiani
during the 1263 Barcelona disputation reflected this dualism – on the one
hand, like other Jewish converts who preceded him, such as Petrus Alfonsi and
Nicolas Donin, Pablo challenged the Talmud as blasphemous and heretical,
while, on the other hand, he supported the Christian creed with evidence
drawn from it.18 This selective method of assessing the Talmud as a multi-
layered textual tradition found its full expression in the Dominican Ramon
Martí’s Pugio fidei contra Mauros et Judaeos (1278), an extensive collection of
rabbinical sources that set out to present a comprehensive view of Christian
theology.
In his preface, Martí rejected the traditional Jewish view of the Oral Torah
given by God at Sinai on the basis of the “innumerable absurdities found in
the Talmud”.19 However, there are also statements “which recognize the truth,
which in all ways effuse and present the doctrine of the prophets and the holy
patriarchs, which – as shall be clear in this book – exhibit strongly and une-
quivocally Christian truth, and which destroy and confound the perfidious
faith of present-day Jews”.20 The psychological impact of hearing a revered
source cited in the name of the rival faith must have been considerable. As
Martí rhetorically queried: “What is more pleasant than turning the sword from
the hand of the enemy and fighting him with his own weapons, as Judith once
did?”21 The fatiguing Tortosa and San Mateo disputation of 1413–1414 proved

15 Grabois 1975, 634.

16 “Learned men, since their knowledge is their domain, like to believe that intolerance origi-
nates in ignorance. The beginning of the Wissenschaft vom Judentum in the nineteenth cen-
tury was founded on this cliché. What we know about anti-Judaism of later Middle Ages con-
firms the opposite impression” (Funkelstein 1971, 382).
17 Cortabarría Beitia 1998.
18 Chazan 1983, 289–306.
19 Martí 1687, 3.
20 Martí 1687, 3. Translation quoted from Chazan 1983, 293–294.
21 Martí, 1687, 3.

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 Tela Ignea Satanae 265

the efficacy of this new polemical method, when hundreds of Jews apostatized.
That said, Pugio fidei probably did not have a very wide readership until it was
published in the modern era.22
The attractiveness of Hebrew scholarship in the early modern era may be
attributed to two aspects that originally manifested in the Middle Ages: first,
the quest for Veritas Hebraica that was enthusiastically revived in reformed
circles; second, the consistent and ongoing interest in religious controversy.
Scholars such as Johannes Reuchlin (1454–1522) laid an important foundation
for the growth of Hebrew scholarship in the pre-Reformation period; however
it was mainly the Protestant reformers who decisively changed the Christian
relationship to Hebrew, by using it as a tool to attack the authority of tradition-
al Catholic doctrine.23
Christian scholars produced basic Hebrew textbooks, encouraged Christian
presses to print Hebrew books, and pressed rulers and university authorities
to establish chairs of Hebrew studies at universities.24 Although these studies
focused on Biblical Hebrew, and their main goal was the interpretation of the
Old Testament,25 a series of grammars, dictionaries, and manuals also served
to open a wider world of post-biblical Jewish literature to the extent that Hans
Joachim Schoeps would note that “during the seventeenth century, Lutheran
scholars studied rabbinical literature more intensively than any other group of
non-Jews before or since”.26

22 It was first printed by Joseph de Voisin in Paris, in 1651. The most well-known and heavily
used version is the second edition prepared by Johann Benedict Carpzov in Leipzig, in 1687,
which also includes his In theologiam Judaicam introductio. There is a reprint of this edition
from 1967. For an assessment of the text’s popularity on the basis of the number manuscripts
preserved, see Limor 1996a, 178. Although not accessible in printed versions until the mid-
seventeenth century, the extent of the influence of Pugio fidei can be measured by the number
of its plagiaristic imitators: for example, Salvaticus Porchetus (d. 1315) in Victoria adversus
impios Hebraeos, which was edited by the Dominican Agustino Giustiniani, in 1520, Petrus
Galatinus in De arcanis Catholicae veritatis (1518), Philippe de Mornay in De veritate religion is
Christianae (1583), and Hugo Grotius in a section of a work also entitled De veritate religion is
Christianae (1622 in Dutch, 1627 in Latin). For a survey of these works, see Rooden 1989, 176–
182.
23 The inverse is also true; Catholic opponents of the Reformation responded with a greater
effort to educate their own scholars in Hebrew. Truly, the Protestant and Catholic Hebrew
students together formed a completely new market for Hebrew books that grew by thousands
of potential customers each decade after 1520. See Burnett 2012, 2.
24 Burnett 2012, 27–42.
25 Eighty per cent of this production consisted of books focused on the Hebrew language
itself or on the Hebrew Bible; however, these scholars provided a linguistic key that proved
useful for studying a wider variety of Jewish books. Burnett 2012, 3.
26 Schoeps 1952, 134.

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266 Markéta Kabůrková

Jewish studies became a new academic discipline, serving to make Jewish

learning more accessible to the educated public, which had an impact on the posi-
tion of Judaism and the Jews within the Christian majority. Christian Hebraists
had, in effect, appropriated Jewish literature from its rightful custodians, an exam-
ple of what Ronnie Po-chia Hsia called “the dialectic of Christian power”.27
Christian Hebraists made use of their Jewish knowledge in a variety of
ways related to both their internal theological needs and their external rela-
tions with the differing religious systems. Exegetical use was mainly confined
to two areas: using Jewish cultural history (antiquitates Judaicae) to illustrate
challenging biblical passages and to compare similes, sentences, proverbs, and
sayings in the New Testament with those in the Talmud. Rabbinical commen-
taries helped to elucidate numerous difficult Old Testament words and phras-
es, as well as explaining many rituals that might lend themselves to Messianic
interpretation.
Although no Christian Hebraist denied the fact that rabbinical writings
contained many absurd, foolish, and fabulous things, many impious and blas-
phemous statements, and many heretical opinions, not everything that ap-
peared senseless at first sight was necessarily so, because, as Johannes Buxtorf
the Elder (1564–1629) explained in the preface to his Lexicon Chaldaicum, Tal-
mudicum et rabbinicum: “The ancient Jewish people explained, as other Orien-
tal peoples, hidden mysteries (arcana mysteria) by figures of speech and ob-
scure allegories (per figuras et enigmata) and by pleasant, clever, witty and
effective expositions, often being similar to tales and invented stories, in order
to sweetly attract the rude and simple-minded crowd to reading and skilfully
catch them by enticements (illecebra) and closely train the clever readers to
scrutinize and expound the profound mysteries lying under a splendid cover-
ing (cortex).”28
Information contained in Jewish writings was considered both useful and
dangerous to Christian readers.29 In the Basel edition of the Talmud (1578–1580),30

27 Hsia 1994, 224.

28 Buxtorf the Elder 1607 [1824], 2; quoted from Eskhult 2007, 20. Other Hebraists shared this
opinion: for example, Heinrich Jacob van Bashuysen (1679–1750), Johann Benedict Carpzov
(1639–1699), Wilhelm Surenhuys (1666–1729), and Hadrianus Reland (1676–1718). For a survey
of other scholars, see Wolf 1715–1733, vol. 2, 976.
29 As Buxtorf the Elder claimed concerning Jewish commentaries in the margins of the Biblia
rabbinica. He considered them indispensable for any interpreter who searched for the literal
sense of biblical passages, because the commentators were such excellent grammarians. How-
ever, the commentaries also contained “perverse and false interpretations, particularly in
those passages, which discussed the messiah”, which, surprisingly, Buxtorf did not censor,
instead letting them stand as a testimony to the unbelief of the Jews. Burnett 1996, 187.
30 This edition was published by Ambrosius Froben, see Raz-Krakotzkin 2007, 146–148. The
problem of Hebrew censorship is also addressed in Burnett 1998, 329–348, esp. 331.

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 Tela Ignea Satanae 267

the whole tractate ‛Avodah Zarah was omitted, and even Reuchlin, a great advo-
cate for Jewish books, had damned Sefer ha-Niẓẓaḥon and Toledot Yešu as blasphe-
mous and “an affront not only the laws of God, but forbidden under Roman and
imperial German law as well”.31 In this matter, he concurred for once with his main
adversary, the Jewish convert Johannes Pfefferkorn, who considered Sefer ha-
Niẓẓaḥon the ultimate anti-Christian text, an arsenal of Jewish anti-Christian argu-
ments, and a major obstacle to the conversion of the Jews.
Despite their abusive nature, controversial writings were highly attractive
to Christian Hebraists, and they often made a considerable effort to acquire
them. Reuchlin’s copy of Sefer ha-Niẓẓaḥon was seized in a raid on the house
of the Jew Johel in Mainz, in autumn 1487.32 Sebastian Münster subsequently
copied this book when he was living in Tübingen between 1511 and 1514. It and
other Hebrew books of religious controversy were passed from one Christian
reader to another. Scholars involved in the transmission of polemical works
did this in three ways: through censored imprints in the original language,
through translation, and through excerpts in their own works.33
Christians began to respond to Sefer ha-Niẓẓaḥon soon after it was written.
The first reaction came from the bishop of Brandenburg, Stefan Bodeker (1384–
1459), just a few years after Lipmann’s death.34 Bodeker, who did not read
Hebrew, was probably told about the book’s anti-Christian arguments by local
converts. A number of converts criticized the book, Victor von Carben (1504),
Johannes Pfefferkorn (1507–1528), and Anthonius Margaritha (1530) among
them. Luther35 was also aware of the book. Some critics tried to condemn the
book altogether, while others focused on countering its arguments, with the
term anti-Lipmanniana36 becoming an all-encompassing designation for the
entire literary corpus.37
Theodor Hackspan was born in Weimar and studied in Jena and Helmsted
under the Lutheran theologians Georg Calixtus (1586–1656) and Konrad Horne-

31 Reuchlin 1999, 54–56; Reuchlin 2000, 34–35.

32 Burnett 2005, 44.
33 Pfefferkorn criticized Sefer ha-Niẓẓaḥon in his Mirror of the Jews (1507). However, it is pos-
sible that both he and Reuchlin confused Mühlhausen’s book with Sefer Niẓẓaḥon Vetus, an
anonymous compendium containing considerably harsher polemics against Christianity. Kauf-
mann 1927, 92–93; Reuchlin 2000, 34–35; Shamir 2011, 66.
34 Wolf 1715–1733, vol. 1, 736.
35 Burnett 2005, 49–50.
36 For a detailed discussion of anti-Lipmanniana literature, see Kaufmann 1927, 90–109.
37 Among others, Sebastian Münster and Paul Fagius addressed the issues raised in the book
in 1542, Johannes Buxtorf the Elder in 1603, Wilhelm Schickard in 1623, Constantin l’Empereur
in 1641, and Eisenmenger in 1700.

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268 Markéta Kabůrková

jus (1590–1649). In 1631, he moved to Altdorf, where he was appointed profes-

sor of Oriental languages in 1636. In 1654, he became a professor of theology.
Working with a book that he had stolen from a rabbi in Schnaittach, in the
Duchy of Franconia, he had already published Yom-Tov Lipmann Mühlhaus-
en’s Sefer ha-Niẓẓaḥon some ten years earlier.
The story of the editio princeps – emblematic of the Hebraist approach to
Jewish anti-Christian literature – was described by another German orientalist
and polyhistor, Johann Christoph Wolf, in his Bibliotheca Hebraica more than
half a century after the event. Hackspan had searched for the book for a long
time before receiving word that a certain rabbi in the neighbouring town of
Schnaittach had a copy, which he refused to show to anyone. Hackspan, ac-
companied by his students, visited the rabbi and engaged him in a disputation.
In the heat of the debate, the rabbi took out the hidden manuscript to consult
it, and Hackspan snatched the book out of his hands, ran off with it to his
carriage, and took it back to Altdorf. He set a few of his Hebrew students to
the task copying assigned sections of the book. After a short time, the rabbi of
Schnaittach arrived in Altdorf and reclaimed the original manuscript.38

38 Wolf 1715–1733, vol. 4, 893–895:

Nizzachon ejus ab Hackspanio primum editum esse supra monuimus. Illius autem singu-
lari arte factus est compos. Degebat nempe ea tempestate Schnaittachi, vico, Altorfio
tertio free lapide distante, Judaeus, Synagogae, ut videtur, Praefectus, qui, cum in sermo-
nibus suis ad hune librum frequenter provocarer, nullis precibus adduci poterat, ut eum
Hackspanio vel inspicendum daret. Ad Judaeum itaque cum studiosis quibusdam desti-
nato consilio profectus tandem obtinuit, ut liber sibi in manus traderetur. Idem, comiti-
bus, ut erat ex compacto constitutum, Judaeo varia objicientibus, eumque distrahenti-
bus, revolvens ad tempum libellum, sed possessorem tandem ad alia mente esse infixum
advertens, et spatium sibi elabendi datum putans, foras progressus jam paratum carpen-
tum conscendit, et remis velisque adhibitis citato gradu cum MS. avolavit. Vix Altorfium
redierat, cum codicem in partes dissectum, discipulis quisbundam fuis, nominatim Se-
baldo Snellio, Jo. Henr. Blendingero, et Jo. Frischmutho describendum dedit, Judaeo au-
tem, postero statim die sua repetenti, restituit. Ex quo non potuit non fieri, ut mendis
variis tollendis Wagenseilio occasio nasceretur.

For the first time, this [book] Niẓẓaḥon was edited by Hackspan, as we have recalled
above. He is also the author of this unique work. At that time a certain Jew, the official
of the synagogue, lived in Schnaittach, a village three stones away from Altdorf. He saw
that he often consulted some book during their conversations, but no prayers could in-
duce him to let Hackspan look inside it. [One day,] he and his students came to see that
Jew pretending to seek a piece of advice from him, but it was a plan to obtain the book.
Thus, as the group had decided, they distracted the Jew with various objections, where-
fore he turned his attention to the booklet for some time. When [Hackspan] noted that
the owner was concentrated on his thoughts, he was already prepared. He rushed out,
mounted into the carriage, and like using two oars, he quickly ran away with the manu-

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 Tela Ignea Satanae 269

Hackspan published the text in the original language without alterations.

However, the linguistic abilities of his students were far from perfect, and the
hasty proofreading overlooked numerous errors, many of which were admit-
tedly minor in nature. Soon after the book was published, sections were trans-
lated into Latin, with a full translation by Johann Heinrich Blendinger appear-
ing in 1645.
Hackspan decided to publish Sefer ha-Niẓẓaḥon in its original language,
without a translation; however, he added his own treatise, De scriptorum Judai-
corum in Theologia usu vario et multiplici, which was considerably longer than
the Mühlhausen’s text.39 It includes a preface to the polemic but the primary
focus is on a programme for scholarly commitment to Jewish literature. In the
first chapter, Hackspan accounts for the various opinions among the Christians
about the Jews and their writings. The second chapter deals with Jewish gram-
matical writings, the Talmud, and related polemical writings. The third chapter
asserts the importance of Jewish writings to understanding the Aramaic Bible
paraphrases and the New Testament, as well as for an accurate treatment of
the Qur’an. The fourth chapter insists on the value of the rabbinical writings
to Christian theological controversies. He championed the use of the Jewish
tradition, including the Masoretic reading of the biblical text, and searched for
explanations in the rabbinic writings: “Just as we turn to our use (in usum
nostrum convertimus) that which the pagan authors have taught, if right and
true, thus we ought to esteem the truths that are to be found in the Talmud as
regards the rituals, the theology of the ancient Jews and their exposition of the
Scriptures and leave the nonsense behind.”40 Hackspan attached great impor-
tance to the Talmud in elucidating the history, rituals, and laws of the ancient
Jewish people. “No one will explain it better than the Jews (nemo reetius expli-
cabit, quam Judaeus). We ought to consult them no less than we consult the
Romans about the Law of the Twelve Tables, the Athenians about the Athenian
laws, the Mohammedans about the Islamic laws.”41

script. As soon as he had returned to Altdorf, he divided the codex into several parts,
which he assigned to his various students [to copy them]. Among them were Sebald Snel-
lius, Johannes Heinrich Blendinger, and Johannes Frischmut. The same day, the Jew
came to demand the return [of his book]. For that reason it could not been done [proper-
ly], therefore Wagenseil got the opportunity to amend numerous mistakes [in the copy].
See also Limor and Yuval 2004, 166.
39 297 pages versus some 200 pages. This work is briefly described by Bobzin 1993 and Fried-
rich 1988, 67.
40 Mühlhausen 1644, 36 (Hackspan’s preface to Sefer ha-Niẓẓaḥon called Accessit tractatus de
usu librorum Rabbinicorum). Translation from Eskhult 2007, 22.
41 Hackspan 1664, 6 (Notae philologico-theologicae). Also quoted by Abraham Calovius in his
Biblia Testamenti Veteris illustrata, 1672, 16–17, where the various perspectives of Christian He-
braists on the value of Jewish exegesis are addressed. Translation from Eskhult 2007, 23.

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270 Markéta Kabůrková

It was in Hackspan’s plan to utilize the knowledge extracted from Hebrew

material – the truths hidden among many untruths – just as Wilhelm Schickard
had “plucked his information from rabbinic darkness and exposed it to
light”.42 However, in another sense, Hackspan also hoped that he could arrive
at a consensus with the Jews regarding how certain Old Testament passages
pertain to the Messiah; therefore, we cannot entirely downplay the prevailing
missionary agenda. The Protestants were generally of the opinion that their
newly cleansed form of Christianity might prove more attractive to Jews than
the Roman Catholicism.43
Hackspan’s successor as professor of Oriental languages in Altdorf, Johann
Christoph Wagenseil,44 continued his predecessor’s practice of publishing He-
brew anti-Christian literature. He began his career at the university by publish-
ing the mishnaic tractate Soṭah, accompanied by extracts from the Gemarah
and from a midrashic collection ‛Ein Ya‛aqov, along with Latin translations and
his own commentary.45 Drawing upon two other manuscripts of Sefer ha-
Niẓẓaḥon that he had managed to obtain, he also published Correctiones Lip-
mannianae as an addendum.
In 1681, Wagenseil prepared a voluminous collection of polemical texts,
together with their Latin translations, occasionally accompanied by refuta-
tions. He called it Tela ignea Satanae: Arcani et horribiles Judaeorum adversus
Christum Deum et Christianiam Religionem Libri, ANEKΔOTOI. The title of the
book was a symptomatic and eloquent attestation to the established opinion
Christians held about Jewish writings and Judaism in general, translating as
“Fiery Darts of Satan: Secret and Horrible Books of Jews Against Christ the God
and Against Christians, so far Unpublished”. The “demonization of the Jew”
represented a strong element in the complex of anti-Jewish prejudice that was
glaringly apparent in the popular Christian beliefs of the early modern pe-
riod.46
The word “anecdote” comes from the work of Procopius of Caesarea, the
biographer of Justinian I, who produced a work entitled Ἀνέκδοτα (Anékdota,
variously translated as Unpublished Memoirs or Secret History), which is pri-
marily a collection of accounts of brief incidents from Justinian’s private life.

42 Schickard in Ius Regium Hebraeorum, 1625; for the quotation, see Manuel 1992, 75 and 77.
43 Bell and Burnett 2006. Martin Luther’s initial sympathy for Jewish resistance to the Catho-
lic Church, and a significant change his opinion underwent later, might serve as an exemplary
case. Kaufmann 2013; Cohen 1991.
44 For biographical details, see Blastenbrei 2004, 12–37.
45 Wagenseil, Sota. Hoc est liber mischinicus De uxore adulterii suspecta, 1674.
46 Trachtenberg 1943; Cohen 1996.

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 Tela Ignea Satanae 271

Gradually, the term anecdote came to be applied to any short tale meant to
emphasize or illustrate whatever point the author wished to make.47 Greek
ἀνέκδοτον (anékdoton) means “unpublished” – literally “not given out” or
“unrevealed”. The subtitle denoted that the collection included previously un-
known material and emphasized the obscure, concealed character of particular
texts.
Following the initial prayer and prefaces, there is a text incorrectly attrib-
uted to Rabbi Yom-Tov Lipmann Mühlhausen, who, as we have seen, was a
popular target of Christian Hebraist criticism. The text,48 known as Zichron
Sefer Niẓẓaḥon, was in fact an anonymous polemical piyyuṭ drawing on anti-
Christian argumentation typical of Ashkenazi polemics. Wagenseil added Car-
minis R. Lipmanni Confutatio, an extensive refutation of this text, in which he
used scriptural exegesis to support Christian doctrines, such as the Trinity. This
section also included an exchange of letters between the Hebraist Johann Ste-
phan Rittangel and a Jew and an excerpt from the Šalšelet ha-Qabbalah.49
The second polemical text was Sefer Niẓẓaḥon Vetus, an anthology that was
probably assembled in the second half of the thirteenth century50 and is a
perfect example of “a typical Ashkenazi polemic”.51 It was Wagenseil, who
called it “old” (vetus) to distinguish it from Mühlhausen’s Sefer ha-Niẓẓaḥon,
given that the term sefer niẓẓaḥon (“book of victory”) could denote any polemi-
cal book.
Records of two medieval religious disputations followed: the Paris disputa-
tion between Rabbi Yeḥiel and Nicolas Donin and the Barcelona debate be-
tween Naḥmanides (Ramban) and Friar Pablo Christiani. A long section was
devoted to Sefer Ḥizzuk ’Emunah, written in the second half of the sixteenth
century by the Karaite scholar Isaac of Troki. The last anti-Christian text was
Sefer Toledot Yešu, accompanied by Wagenseil’s response. The final addition
was a hundred-page text dealing with the difficult passages in Daniel, based
on the computations of an English antiquarian and writer on chronology John
Marsham (1602–1685) and a Swedish theologian and mathematician Johannes
Bilberg (1646–1717).

47 In this sense, it started to appear in European languages around the mid-seventeenth cen-
tury.
48 Davidson 1928, 75–76; Kaminka 1928.
49 An historical document composed by an Italian Jew, Gedaliah ’ibn Yaḥya ben Yosef (c.
1515–1587).
50 Berger 1979, 33.
51 Limor and Stroumsa 1996, 196; Berger 1991, 484–513; Berger 1979, 352–353; Trautner-Kro-
mann 1993, 102; Urbach 1935, 72. All located the place of origin in northern France and the
Rheinish area, perhaps Alsace-Lorraine.

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272 Markéta Kabůrková

The selected texts were diverse; however, they shared a certain notoriety
that preceded any actual knowledge of their contents, which were deemed to
be “arcani et horribiles”, as the attribution of secrecy remained an enduring
component in shaping perceptions of the Jewry. The attribution of concealed
qualities to any group of people within a society has served throughout history
to create difference and hierarchy. “By implication, knowledge of a secret
grants the initiate control over it, conferring authority and enhancing prestige;
disclosure could lead to its dilution and distortion.”52
Secrecy is a recurrent and striking motif in books about Jews and Judaism
written by both converts from Judaism and Christian Hebraists in the early
modern period. The titles of innumerable works on the Jews promised to re-
veal, uncover, detect, or lay bare some aspect of Judaism or Jewishness that
had hitherto remained veiled, covered, or arcane. By removing the cloak of
secrecy, the “the naked truth” (nuda veritas) would finally be exposed. The
allusion to secrecy was much more than a compelling advertisement for the
book, although it clearly served that purpose as well. Primarily, it signified
how Jews were perceived and described in the early modern era, with anti-
Christian polemical literature serving as a clear manifestation of this attitude.
The “exposition” of anti-Christian writings dates back to the early Middle
Ages,53 but accelerated during the thirteenth century with the increase of inter-
est in Jews as the most conspicuous non-Christian minority remaining in Eu-
rope. Jewish texts represented an attractive target for both intellectual curiosity
and religious zeal. The Christian polemicist had to become acquainted with his
Jewish rival, to know his beliefs from within, in order to be able to debate with
him and convince him of the truth of Christianity. The early modern Hebraist
lived in a world already imbued with empirical scientific curiosity; he was
obliged to cloak his interest in the appropriate context of a scholarly work, but
his opinion of Judaism, the Jews, and the Jewish texts did not differ all that
much from that of his medieval predecessors. The essence of his endeavour
was to contest Judaism as the rival faith, or even more – to subvert it with the
claim that he, and not the Jews themselves, correctly understood the Jewish
literary tradition.

52 Carlebach 1996, 116.

53 For example, Agobard de Lyon (c. 779–840) was acquainted with the Toledot Yešu tradi-
tion, Cohen 1999, 123–145, esp. 131.

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 Tela Ignea Satanae 273

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