The legend of the man who outraged Christ and was therefore damned by Him to continue living until the Second Coming circulated in early modern Europe thanks to medieval chronicles and oral tales. The passage from the legend to the Wandering Jew myth was marked by the publication in Lutheran circles of the pamphlet Kurtze Beschreibung und Erzehlung eines Juden mit Namen Ahasverus… (A brief Description and Tale of a Jew by name Ahasuerus…, 1602). The tale satisfied the best expectations of the readers of colportage literature, and it became very popular all over Europe due to its translation into French (1605) and other languages. Over a period of some decades, the eternal and wandering Jew, Ahasuerus, overshadowed his predecessors in the cultural memory of the Old Continent. The figure fascinated and frightened at the same time, and, while stimulating the creativity of many writers and artists, it also fueled anti-Jewish prejudice. The German reception of the myth from the 19th to the first half of the 20th century proves how present and important it also was in the modernperiod, and how Jewish writers reacted to the stigma of Ahasuerus. Indeed, even if the pamphlet shows a sympathetic attitude towards its protagonist, this personage was not considered just a single individual but rather as an emblem of the whole homeless Jewish people. The Lutheran interpretation of the Diaspora of the Jews as the consequence of their original and unredeemable guilt against Christ found its aesthetic concretion in the penitent never resting. Ahasuerus wanders throughout Europe and waits for a redemption which is delayed until the end of time.
Eterno e senza requie: Ahasverus e la redenzione sospesa dell'Ebreo errante.
serena grazzini
2023-01-01
Abstract
The legend of the man who outraged Christ and was therefore damned by Him to continue living until the Second Coming circulated in early modern Europe thanks to medieval chronicles and oral tales. The passage from the legend to the Wandering Jew myth was marked by the publication in Lutheran circles of the pamphlet Kurtze Beschreibung und Erzehlung eines Juden mit Namen Ahasverus… (A brief Description and Tale of a Jew by name Ahasuerus…, 1602). The tale satisfied the best expectations of the readers of colportage literature, and it became very popular all over Europe due to its translation into French (1605) and other languages. Over a period of some decades, the eternal and wandering Jew, Ahasuerus, overshadowed his predecessors in the cultural memory of the Old Continent. The figure fascinated and frightened at the same time, and, while stimulating the creativity of many writers and artists, it also fueled anti-Jewish prejudice. The German reception of the myth from the 19th to the first half of the 20th century proves how present and important it also was in the modernperiod, and how Jewish writers reacted to the stigma of Ahasuerus. Indeed, even if the pamphlet shows a sympathetic attitude towards its protagonist, this personage was not considered just a single individual but rather as an emblem of the whole homeless Jewish people. The Lutheran interpretation of the Diaspora of the Jews as the consequence of their original and unredeemable guilt against Christ found its aesthetic concretion in the penitent never resting. Ahasuerus wanders throughout Europe and waits for a redemption which is delayed until the end of time.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
