ANTI-SEMITISM IN THE ANCIENT WORLD

Although the word was fi rst coined in 1879, anti- Semitism is by no means new. After the conquests of Alexander the Great (d. 323 B.C.E.), Greekspeaking or "Hellenistic" culture became the norm throughout the eastern Mediterranean region and the Near East. Those who favored Hellenistic culture at times looked down upon Jews. Many Greeks valued reason in pursuit of the truth. Some of them saw the Jews' reliance upon God's revelation (see TORAH) as superstition. Even more Greeks saw the practice of CIRCUMCISION, an important sign of identity for Jewish males, as a distasteful mutilation of the body. Hellenistic culture was not, however, the primary source of anti-Semitism in the ancient world; CHRISTIANITY was. Some see evidence of anti-Semitism in the most sacred writings of Christianity, the New Testament. Pertinent passages include Matthew 23, John 8.34–47, and, most fatefully, Matthew 27.25, in which "the Jews" proclaim themselves and their descendants guilty of JESUS' death. Many biblical scholars see these and other passages as motivated by fi erce competition between Jews and early Christians. They do not consider them historically reliable. On the basis of such passages, ancient Christian teachers could utter fi ercely anti-Semitic statements. For example, John Chrysostom (c. 347–407), a leader of the Orthodox Church in Asia Minor (now Turkey), taught that Jews were viler than wild animals and that all Christians had an obligation to hate them. AUGUSTINE, bishop of Hippo and one of the most infl uential Roman Catholic thinkers, wrote a "Tractate against the Jews." He taught that Jews should be humiliated in punishment for rejecting Jesus.