Episode 10: King Ferdinand and the Jews

00:01 We continue the fascinating story of King Ferdinand and his relationship with the Jews, particularly the Jews of Prague. Although King Ferdinand opposed the demand to expel the Jews from his kingdom, and although both princes, Ferdinand and Maximilian, openly defended them, the head of the Church insisted that the expulsion decree be adopted. He explained that his position reflected the firm view of the Pope, whose hatred of the Jews was very great. The motive behind the expulsion was not only to seize Jewish property, but also to capture Jewish souls. By his reckoning, the decree would lead to mass conversion from Judaism to Christianity. King Ferdinand was helpless. So were his sons, who saw no way to overturn the expulsion decree. Their efforts therefore focused on how much time the Jews would be given before they had to leave the country. In the end, it was decided that the decree would be carried out within two years, after which not a single Jew would remain in the country. At the priests’ insistence, it was also decided that during those two years the Jews would be required to come to the churches to listen to the priests’ sermons. This was meant to prepare them for conversion. The new order was immediately conveyed to the leaders of the communities. The Jews were even more pained by the decree requiring them to enter the churches and hear the priests’ words than by the decree requiring them to leave Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia—the lands ruled by Ferdinand I—within two years. When the head of the Prague community received the expulsion order, he hurried straight to the Maharal’s home. Along with it came the law requiring every Jew in Prague to come to the churches that coming Sunday to hear the priests’ sermons. The Maharal instructed that an urgent general assembly of all the men, women, and children be called for the following morning, after the first minyan, in the synagogue courtyard. Young men were sent to go from

03:11 house to house throughout the city and convey, in the name of Rabbi Maharal, that no Jew—man, woman, or child—was to miss the assembly. No one knew what it was about, though everyone understood that it was something serious, since no such assembly had ever been called in Prague. During the night, a platform was erected in the courtyard, another sign of the gravity of the matter. The people who began streaming there in the early morning felt a hidden fear about what was happening. As soon as the first minyan finished davening, the Maharal emerged from the synagogue, wrapped in a tallis and wearing tefillin, with a Torah scroll in his hands. Behind him came Reb Mordechai Maisel, the head of the community, also wrapped in a tallis and wearing tefillin, with a Torah scroll in his hands. After them, the other rabbis of the city and the heads of the yeshivos came out one by one, all wearing talleisim and tefillin and each carrying a Torah scroll. They all took their places on the platform. Fear and dread fell over the large crowd as they wondered what this sight meant. Suddenly the Maharal’s voice was heard, fervently proclaiming, “Hear, O Israel: Hashem is our G-d, Hashem is One.” He burst into tears, and everyone standing with him on the platform wept too. The entire crowd sensed that a calamity was at hand. The Maharal addressed them: “Listen, Jews. With the words of Shema Yisroel, our forefathers went out to fight the Greeks, who sought to abolish the laws of Hashem’s will and defile the Beis Hamikdash—and they defeated them. With the words of Shema Yisroel, Jews cast themselves into the fires of their enemies and sanctified Hashem’s name. Let the verse Shema Yisroel now kindle the fire of mesirus nefesh in our own hearts and give us the strength to withstand every trial.” The Maharal continued: “The people among whom we live are friendly to us, as are the king and his ministers. But sadly, the priests are terrible enemies to us. They are the ones who dare to confront the children of Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov.” The Maharal then read aloud the king’s royal decree requiring the Jews to come to the churches

06:13 to hear the priests’ sermons, and forbidding any Jewish leader to prevent them from doing so. Again the crowd burst into tears, their weeping spreading and rising to the heavens. Women and elderly people fainted and dissolved in tears. After a short while, the Maharal called for silence. His voice was heard again. “Come,” he said, “let us stop crying. Instead of showing weakness, let us all—younger and older, men and women—show firmness and courage, and thereby sanctify the name of Heaven. Let us all swear here, holding the Torah scrolls, that none of us will go to hear a priest’s sermon. And if we are dragged into a church by force, we will stop up our ears. Are you ready to take this oath upon yourselves?” “We swear! We swear!” everyone cried out together. “We swear by our lives and the lives of our children that we will never listen to the priests’ words on matters of faith.” The Maharal instructed them to repeat word for word after the chazzan, who proclaimed, “Hear, O Israel: Hashem is our G-d, Hashem is One. Blessed be the name of His glorious kingdom forever and ever. And Hashem is G-d.” Shofars were sounded, and the kohanim went up to duchan and blessed those assembled. When the gathering ended, the Maharal, the other rabbis, and the community leaders submitted a petition to the king demanding that the decree requiring them to listen to the priests be rescinded. The petition stated that the Jews had sworn to remain faithful to Judaism, and that continuing to enforce the decree could therefore lead to tragedy, since the Jews would be forced to give up their lives. Accompanied by the community leaders, the Maharal visited Prince Ferdinand and asked him to put a stop to the priests’ audacity. They had already begun entering the Jewish streets and inciting people against the Jews’ faith, leading to clashes. In these incidents, the Jews were actually helped by their non-Jewish neighbors, who could not bear the priests’ disgraceful treatment of them. More than once, the priests were forcibly driven out of the Jewish streets. The priests were quick to exploit such incidents to make false accusations against the Jews, but there were always non-Jewish neighbors who testified on the Jews’ behalf and brought about the arrest of the agitators. And so

09:13 these tumultuous events continued day after day. The priests, who had expected to convert many Jews, were bitterly disappointed when their prolonged efforts achieved nothing. The decree requiring Jews to come to the churches was not observed at all. Jews who were dragged into a church by strongmen hired by the priests stopped up their ears and did not hear a word the priests said. The priests tried every means, with enormous effort and at vast expense, to demonstrate some success. After a long time, they managed to catch three Jews in their net. Two of them had been known for years in the Jewish neighborhood as mentally unstable. The third was a chronic drunk who was always stumbling through the streets intoxicated. The priests realized that they had no chance of converting the Jews, whether through kindness or threats. All the Jews remained steadfast in their faith despite the priests’ every effort, and the priests gave up hope. Three months before the date set for the Jews’ expulsion from Ferdinand’s kingdom, at the end of the two years, the head of the Church came to the king and reminded him of his promise to expel them. The royal treasury was then in far worse condition than before. The king knew full well that if the Jews were indeed expelled from the country, the financial crisis would grow still worse. Tax revenues would fall almost to nothing. On the other hand, the king felt he had no choice but to keep his promise. He was therefore in a difficult quandary. His sons, Princes Ferdinand and Maximilian, advised him to send one of the Jewish leaders to the Pope in Rome to seek a release for the king from the vow the cardinal had forced him to make to carry out the expulsion. The mission was assigned to Rabbi Mordechai Maisel of Prague. By then the Pope was Pius IV, who had succeeded Paul IV and was friendlier to the Jews than his predecessor. When Reb Mordechai Maisel was received by the Pope and spoke with him, he made a good impression, and the Pope agreed to grant the king of

11:54 Bohemia and Moravia the authorization needed to prevent the expulsion of the Jews. When Rabbi Mordechai arrived in Prague with the authorization in hand, the Jews rejoiced greatly. The king handed the matter over to his son Maximilian, and in 5323 the decree was canceled entirely. In 5361, about forty years later—yes, forty years later—Rabbi Mordechai Maisel, the head of the Prague community, passed away. Rabbi Shmuel, a grandson of the Maharal, was appointed head of the community in his place. The Maharal himself passed away on 18 Elul 5369, at the age of ninety-seven—eight years after his grandson Shmuel’s appointment. The Maharal reserved three graves in the Prague cemetery: one for himself, one for his scholarly wife Perel, and one for his only son, Rabbi Betzalel. But since Rabbi Betzalel passed away in Cologne, where he served as a rosh yeshivah, and was buried there, the Maharal designated the third grave for his grandson Rabbi Shmuel. Years passed, and when Rabbi Shmuel turned seventy-nine, he felt himself growing weaker. Shmuel summoned an official of the chevra kadisha and reminded him that the third grave beside his grandfather the Maharal’s grave was meant for him. The official told him there was a serious problem: the space left there was so small that a grave could not be dug. It emerged that over the years, under pressure from various prominent people who wanted to be buried near the Maharal, the area had filled with graves dug close together. Little by little, almost without anyone noticing, they had encroached on the Maharal family’s burial plot until very little open space remained. Rabbi Shmuel said, “I insist on my right to be buried there.” He advised the official to go to his holy grandfather’s grave and remind him that he himself had designated the adjoining plot for his grandson’s burial. “Surely,” Shmuel said, “my grandfather will keep

15:06 his promise.” And indeed, when Rabbi Shmuel passed away in 5415, they followed this advice. Afterward, the plot in question expanded of its own accord, leaving ample room to dig a grave for the Maharal’s grandson, Rabbi Shmuel. Rabbi Shmuel had a son whom he named Yehuda Leib after his ancestor, the Maharal. This grandson was gifted with great abilities and became an outstanding Torah scholar. At that time, Rabbi Eliyahu Baal Shem of Worms settled in Prague. Rabbi Eliyahu Baal Shem’s name had become well known during the Maharal’s lifetime. After many years of teaching Torah in his yeshivos in Worms and then in Chełm, Poland, which produced hundreds of students, he moved his yeshivah to Prague. Both the revealed and the hidden dimensions of Torah were studied there. Rabbi Shmuel, the Maharal’s grandson, was very wealthy and contributed large sums of his own money to support this exceptional yeshivah. When Rabbi Eliyahu Baal Shem of Worms arrived in Prague, he added a new preparatory division for young boys. Unlike his yeshivos in Worms and Chełm, which were intended only for married students, this yeshivah also accepted younger students. Rabbi Shmuel sent his son Yehuda Leib to the preparatory division, and Yehuda Leib excelled in his studies. When Rabbi Shmuel passed away, as we said, Rabbi Eliyahu Baal Shem of Worms was 108 years old. When it became necessary to go to the Maharal’s grave and remind the tzaddik about the burial plot he had designated for his grandson, Rabbi Eliyahu Baal Shem sent ten of his students to carry out the task. He himself also attended the funeral and delivered a eulogy. Rabbi Yehuda Leib, the Maharal’s grandson, inherited considerable wealth from his father, Rabbi Shmuel. Members of the community chose Rabbi Yehuda Leib to succeed his father as its head, but he declined, saying that he did not have the

17:57 qualities needed for such an honored position. Rabbi Yehuda Leib also endured suffering. His first wife passed away, leaving him with young children. A second woman whom he married also passed away, about a year after his father’s death, again leaving young children. Before his passing, Rabbi Eliyahu Baal Shem, the Torah scholar and kabbalist, called his student Rabbi Yehuda Leib to him. He told him that he foresaw a good future for him in the city of Poznań and blessed him with long life. Three years later, a match was proposed for Yehuda Leib with Sarah, the daughter of Rabbi Chaim of Poznań, a great Torah scholar and a very wealthy man. In 5408, at the age of fifty-six, Yehuda Leib moved to Poznań. Seven years later, in 5427, their son Rabbi Moshe was born. He would later become the great-grandfather of Rabbi Schneur Zalman, author of the Tanya and founder of Chabad Chassidus.