Episode 128: Di Litzatia Rebukes the Pope for His Abuse of the Jews

00:00 The story of Di Lezziata. The members of the distinguished papal delegation arrived at Di Lezziata’s lodging to bring him to the festive reception awaiting him. And... he was not there. They did not know what to do. They sent a rider back to the Vatican to report what had happened and ask what to do next. The cardinals at the Vatican were stunned to hear the rider’s account: the elderly Di Lezziata had disappeared from his lodging, and the delegation sent to receive him was awaiting instructions. After a brief consultation, they told the rider to ask the delegation to search other lodgings, assuming that Di Lezziata had decided to move to another one. One thing was clear: the reception had to go ahead as planned. There was no point in canceling Di Lezziata’s appearance, since all the distinguished guests had already gathered at the papal palace and were awaiting the guest of honor’s arrival to begin the ceremony. The rider returned from the Vatican to the delegation with the instructions, and the entire entourage spread out among the lodgings. The splendid papal procession, with its ceremonial carriages escorted by riders in uniform, attracted a great deal of attention, but every search came up empty. Di Lezziata was nowhere to be found. Let’s find out what happened. Di Lezziata had decided not to wait for someone to collect him for the reception and had set off there on foot. When he reached the Vatican, he approached one of the servants and said that he had an appointment with the pope, so he asked to be admitted. The servant did not know that, in another wing of the palace, a lavish reception had been prepared for a distinguished guest who was none other than that Jew— that old man standing before him. He seated the visitor in a waiting room, then went into the office of a senior official and told him that an unfamiliar man was asking to see the pope. It did not occur to the official to connect this unfamiliar man with Di Lezziata, whose arrival everyone at the papal palace was eagerly

02:58 awaiting. The official was furious with the servant for being so foolish that he could not even get rid of troublesome visitors, and for daring to disturb his superior at such a tense moment. As punishment for the servant’s stupidity and insolence, he gave him a resounding slap across the face and ordered him to send the uninvited visitor away at once. The servant, in turn, went out and took out on Di Lezziata all the anger that had built up from the stinging slap and the contempt shown him. He loudly demanded that Di Lezziata leave immediately. When Di Lezziata, in his innocence, did not at once understand what was happening, the servant seized him and dragged him outside. Surprised, Di Lezziata decided to request an appointment with the pope through the usual channels and went into the public reception office. There he stood in the line for people wishing to register for an audience with the pope. Meanwhile, the distinguished delegation sent to bring Di Lezziata to the Vatican returned empty-handed. The master of ceremonies had to inform the assembled guests that the honored visitor had disappeared. The guests began to disperse. The prevailing opinion was that Di Lezziata must have felt at the last moment that he had not yet completed his purification and sanctification and was not worthy of being received by the pope, so he had returned to his seclusion. And so everyone went home. On his way home, one of the Vatican dignitaries who had attended the event stopped at the public reception office in the Vatican to take care of a matter. His shock and amazement cannot be described when he saw the elderly Di Lezziata standing there, waiting his turn. With a mixture of reverence and astonishment, he gathered the courage to approach Di Lezziata and ask what was going on. Di Lezziata innocently told him everything that had happened and said he was waiting his turn for an audience with the pope. At once there was a new commotion. The Vatican official hurried the distinguished visitor into an office and rushed off for an urgent consultation

05:42 to decide how to correct the mistake that had been made. In the end, after consulting the pope himself, they decided to hold the reception again with even greater pomp and ceremony, taking steps to ensure that everything would go smoothly. To make the reception a success and allow for careful planning, the event was postponed to give them enough time to prepare everyone for the special occasion. But Di Lezziata expressed his firm wish to meet the pope alone, because he had something important to tell him and needed to speak with him about a matter of great significance. He stood his ground and refused to be persuaded that the reception should take place. When this was brought to the pope’s attention, the pope agreed to receive him privately. No one was present when the monk Di Lezziata and the pope met alone, and no one knew what they said. The elderly monk spent only twenty minutes in the pope’s room. When he emerged, the cardinals were waiting for him, but Di Lezziata said nothing to them and hurried out of the palace. To the cardinals’ great astonishment, he disappeared. After a few minutes of confusion and bewilderment, one of the cardinals decided to enter the pope’s room. He was stunned to see the pope sitting there, overcome with sadness and distress, his eyes showing signs of intense weeping. The pope did not even look at the cardinal who had entered, and said nothing to him. The cardinal did not dare ask the pope why he had been crying. He returned to the other cardinals and told them what he had seen. All the cardinals did their utmost to solve the mystery of the visit and its aftermath. They offered various theories, but none could truly understand what had happened. An atmosphere of tension took hold of the palace. Everyone there huddled together in conversation day and night, unable to stop talking about the elderly monk’s strange visit. The pope himself shut himself in his room for several weeks. He did not

08:28 allow anyone in, not even his closest associates. The cardinals walked about in mourning, their heads bowed, wondering what the event meant. Secret consultations were held, but nothing was clear. Slowly, the terrible secret began to emerge. It turned out that when Di Lezziata entered the pope’s office, the pope stepped forward warmly and extended the cross for him to kiss, as was their custom. Di Lezziata pushed the cross away, to the great astonishment of the head of the Catholic Church. It also became clear that Di Lezziata was not kneeling, as Christians customarily did on such an occasion. The bewildered pope looked at him questioningly. Had Di Lezziata abandoned Christianity? It turned out that he had. Thirty years earlier, Di Lezziata had distinguished himself in the Church’s debates with the Jews. With his great talent and rhetorical skill, he had managed to defeat many Jews. But doubts about the truth of Christianity had begun to gnaw at him, and he began to question his path. It was precisely through the debates he conducted, including those he had seemingly won, and the written arguments he published, that Di Lezziata himself gradually became convinced that Judaism was the true and just faith. Eventually, he became fully convinced that Judaism was the Torah of truth, and he decided to leave Christianity and become a Jew. Di Lezziata knew he could not do this while he remained in Venice, where he had gained such immense honor and fame that his reputation had reached the Vatican. He also decided that he must not give even the slightest hint of his conclusion to his Christian colleagues, for they would certainly do everything in their power to prevent him from carrying out his decision. So he decided to disappear. When rumors spread that he was traveling to India to withdraw into seclusion, he was actually on his way to Amsterdam in Holland. Amsterdam was then a center of Torah and Jewish life. There he converted to Judaism and was given the Jewish name Avraham.

11:13 In Amsterdam, the former de Laciata, now Avraham, devoted himself to Torah study, without anyone knowing his past or his identity. When he reached the age of seventy, he decided to visit the Pope for one purpose alone: to tell him that he was a Jew. He wanted to explain that the Church was making a grave mistake in its hostile attitude toward Jews and in turning a blind eye to the shedding of Jewish blood and to torture. By encouraging these terrible acts by Christian crowds, it was doing something forbidden. The Church also directly encouraged such acts of oppression. The head of the Church had to know that even when violent power was in his hands, Judaism was in the right, and that Christians of independent spirit would gradually join the Jewish people. Avraham, the righteous convert de Laciata, also intended to call on the Pope to examine his own path and recognize Judaism as the true faith. For twenty minutes without pause, the elderly convert presented his arguments, delivering a sharp rebuke to the Pope. The Pope was stunned and could not utter a word. Long after the elderly man had left his room, the Pope remained seated, deep in thought, with tears running down his cheeks. Several weeks later, the Pope recovered and revealed the mystery of the visit to his close associates. Together they discussed how to keep it from the public. They understood well that a spirit of doubt about Christianity had begun to spread among many Christians. If it continued to grow, many Christians might convert to Judaism—and who knew how far it might go? At the end of their discussions, they decided on steps to intensify the promotion of Christianity on the one hand, and on the other, to root out any sign of doubt about the Church’s righteousness among members of the Christian community in and around the Vatican, even by violent means. Despite everything, the secret began to spread, though the measures taken by the Church meant that almost no further case

13:53 of conversion occurred. Among the Jews themselves, however, this dramatic story stirred feelings of satisfaction and joy.