Ettore Majorana
Foundation and Centre
for Scientific Culture
International School
of Ius Commune
Directors of the
School:
M. Bellomo – K. Pennington – O. Condorelli
XXXII Course, Erice, 5-11
October 2012
The Legal Status of Jews and Muslims in the Ius Commune
La condizione giuridica di
Ebrei e Musulmani nel diritto comune
Director of the XXXII Course
John Tolan (University
of Nantes)
Sponsored by: The
Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research – Sicilian Regional
Government – The European
Research Council programme RELMIN: “The Legal Status of Religious Minorities in
the Euro-Mediterranean World” – Catholic University of America, Washington D.C. –
University of Catania –Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Imola
Purpose
Utrum ritus infidelium
sint tolerandi, asks
Thomas Aquinas in the Summa theologica, “should
the rites of infidels be tolerated?” He concludes that there are limited
grounds for the Church’s tolerating the existence of non-Christian cults. First
and foremost, Judaism: the rites of Jews prefigure those of Christianity and
should hence be allowed to continue as a confirmation of Christian truth. As
for other faiths, they may be tolerated for reasons of expediency: if it would
prove difficult or impossible to prohibit those rites without provoking social
or political unrest (in particular where these infidels are numerous).
Christian legislators and lawyers from the
fifth century on created laws that regulated, protected, or in some cases
prohibited, the practice of other religions. In this course, we will look at
these legists attitudes towards Judaism and Islam. In order to prove that the
Church should indeed allow Jews to practice their religion, Aquinas cites Pope
Gregory I, via Gratian’s Decretum. This
in itself gives an important glimpse at how authority and precedent are
constructed in legal discourse. Yet the question of toleration and protection
of Jewish communities is found in legal sources well before Gregory the Great,
in particular in a number of fourth- and fifth-century imperial constitutions
preserved in the Theodosian code. Popes,
bishops, kings, counts, and city councils issued a bewildering array of laws
authorizing Jews to live in certain areas, build synagogues, trade with
Christians, etc.; other laws prohibited or discouraged certain kinds of
interactions between Jews and Christians; in other cases, Jews were expelled
from cities, counties or kingdoms. In parts of Mediterranean Europe, jurists
posed the same questions concerning Muslims living within Christian polities.
By studying medieval legal discourse on Jews
and Muslims, this course aims not only to contribute to the understanding of
the history of those minority communities within Christian Europe, but also to
reflect on an important dimension of the development of legal thought in
Europe. The existence of non-Christians poses questions about the universality
of Christianity and Christian law. Just as in the early modern period, European
colonization of non-Christian areas provoked debates on the universality of
legal principles (in the works of Las Casas, Grotius and others), in the Middle
Ages the existence of non-Christians both within and outside of Roman
Christendom affected the development of the Ius commune. We will play close
attention to the interplay between theoretical discourse on the legality (or
not) of infidel law and practice and the practical application of law in daily
interactions between Jews, Christians and Muslims.
Lecturers and topics
- Paul Brand (University of Oxford, UK): Jews and the Law in England, 1190-1290
- Dwayne Carpenter (Boston College, USA): Separate, but not equal: Jews and
Muslims in the legislation of Alfonso X, the Learned - Claude Denjean (Université de Toulouse, F): Les juifs et la définition de l’usure
dans le jus commune catalan (XIIIe-XIVe siècles) - Johannes Heil (Hochschule für Jüdische Studien,
Heidelberg, D): “Sicut
Iudaeis” in the 11th century? On the origins of papal protection for Jews - Emma Montanos Ferrín (Universidad de La Coruña, E): Moros y moriscos en los fueros
municipales de Hispania - Capucine Nemo-Pekelman (RELMIN, Université de Nantes,
F) - Youna Masset (RELMIN, Université de Nantes): Le ius commune traitant de la capacité judiciaire des juifs dans
les tribunaux chrétiens et sa réception dans la Catalogne des XIIIe et
XIVe siècles - Andrea
Padovani (Università di Bologna, I): Diritto
canonico, diritto veneto, diritto islamico. Incontri e scontri (secoli
XIV-XV) - Kenneth Pennington (Catholic University of
America, Washington D.C., USA): Jews in the Medieval and Early
Modern Courts - Diego Quaglioni
(Università di Trento, I): Ebrei e
cristiani nel tardo diritto comune: il “judicium” di Johann Jacob Frey
(1701) - Jessie Sherwood (RELMIN,
Université de Nantes, F): How canon law created religious
boundaries between Christians and Jews - Fernando Suárez Bilbao (Universidad Rey
Juan Carlos, Madrid, E): El
fuero judiego en los reinos de Castilla y Aragón (siglos XII-XV) - John Tolan (Université de Nantes, F): Muslims as pagans, heretics, or Jews? The
quandary of classification for medieval jurists - Ragnhild Johnsrud Zorgati (University of Oslo, N):
Intercommunal bathing in the ius
commune and in the ius proprium of medieval and early modern Iberia
Persons
wishing to attend the School are requested to write to:
Professor
Dr. Orazio Condorelli
Facoltà
Giuridica – Via Gallo, 24 – 95124 CATANIA, Italy
Tel
+39.095.230417
e-mail: ocondorelli@lex.unict.it
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