Pope Francis: Reaching out to Italian Jews

Synagogue of Rome (sonofgroucho)

One of the earliest priorities of Pope Francis' papacy was reaching out to Rome's Jewish community.  Reuters reported that the new pope already "sent a message to Rome's chief rabbi, Riccardo Di Segni, inviting him to his inaugural Mass at the Vatican on March 19."

Wikipedia reports that "Italian Jews can be traced back as far as the 2^nd century BCE…"  Although at that time there was "a branch

community in Rome," most of these ancient Jews lived in "the far South of Italy."  Many spoke Greek, and it is believed that some were much later "deported from Judaea by the emperor Titus in 70 CE."

During the Middle Ages, there were major communities of Italian Jews "in southern cities such as Bari and Otranto." After Jews were expelled from the Kingdom of Naples in 1533, their "centre of gravity shifted to Rome and the north."  During the early 1900s, many Italian Jews relocated to Israel.  Decades later, approximately "7,000 Italian Jews were deported and murdered during the Holocaust."

Wikipedia highlights the achievements of two Italian Jews in particular.  Zedekiah ben Abraham Anaw (13^th century CE) preserved a tremendous amount of information on Jewish practices ("laws, regulations, and ceremonies…") by organizing, editing and compiling passages from previous sources into one grand work titled Shibbole ha-Leket ("Ears of Gleaning").  Moshe Chaim Luzzatto (1707 - 1746 CE) "was a prominent

Italian Jewish rabbi, kabbalist and philosopher."  He was not only a master of the Tanakh and Talmud, but is also considered to be "the founder of modern Hebrew literature."

Resources 

  

http://news.yahoo.com/pope-pledges-good-relations-jews-210253524.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Jews

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moshe_Chaim_Luzzatto

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shibbole_ha-Leket

Copyright March 15, 2013 by Linda Van Slyke   All Rights Reserved