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chronological point of view, are also of particular interest. Here as well, popular beliefs, based on magical and superstitious elements, seem
to possess a vigor and a vitality capable of circumventing the precise norms of ritualistic Judaism (halakhah), or of seriously distorting them.
The ritual responses of the Gheonim, the heads of the rabbinical academies of Babylon, active between the VII and XI centuries, refer to the
local custom of boiling perfumes and spices in water, thus rendering them fragrant and odorous, and of circumcising children, making their
blood gush into that liquid until the
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colors were mixed. "It is at this point", the rabbinical response continues, "that all the young males wash themselves in that water, in memory
of the blood of the pact, which has united God to our patriarch Abraham" (22). In this rite, of a propitiatory nature, the blood from the
circumcision wound, united with the sweet-smelling potion, is said to have possessed the ability to transform itself into a potent aphrodisiac,
used in curative electuaries, beneficial in lending vigor to amorous desires and to the procreative abilities of initiated males.
One form of magical cannibalism, related to circumcision, may be found in a custom highly widespread among both the Ashkenazi Jewish
communities and [Jewish?] communities of the Mediterranean region. The women present at the circumcision ceremony but not yet blessed
with progeny of the male sex, anxiously awaited the cutting of the foreskin of the child. At this point, throwing inhibition to the winds, as if
at a pre-established signal, the women hurled themselves upon that piece of bloody flesh. The luckiest woman is alleged to have snatched it
up and gulped it down immediately, before she could be mobbed by the competing females, who must have been no less hardened and highly
motivated. The triumphant winner was in no doubt whatever that the proud tit-bit would be infallibly useful in causing the much-coveted
virile member to germinate inside the impregnated abdomen through sympathetic medicine. The struggle for the foreskin among women
without male progeny appears in some ways similar to today's competition among spinsters and nubile for the conquest of the bride s
bouquet after the wedding ceremony.
Giulio Morosini, alias Shemuel Nahmias, remembered with much annoyance this repellent custom, which he had seen rather in vogue among
the young Jewish women of Venice.
"The superstition of the women is remarkable in this regard. If sterile women wishing to become pregnant happened, as they frequently did,
to be present [at the circumcision ceremony], not a single one of them would hesitate to fight off the others and steal the foreskin; and the
first one to grab it never hesitates to fling it in her mouth and swallow it as a sympathetic remedy of extremely great effectiveness in causing
her to be fruitful" (23).
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Rabbi Shabbatai Lipshütz confirmed this extraordinary custom "of the struggle amongst the women to swallow the foreskin after the cutting
of the foreskin, as a wonderful secret (segullah) in the production of male children". He added there were rabbis who permitted it, such as the
famous North African cabbalist Chaim Yosef David Azulay,
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known as the Chidah (the Enigma), and the rabbi from Salonica, Chaim Abraham Miranda, while others energetically prohibited it,
considering it a scandalous and impermissible practice (24). But the cabbalistic herb alchemist (Rafael Ohana), expert in the secrets of
procreation, although he possessed little skill in gynecological sciences, referred with satisfaction to the results obtained from women having
swallowed the foreskin of a circumcised boy, even in recent times. In his guide, intended for women wishing to have children and entitled
Mar'eh ha-yaladim ("He Who Shows the Children"), the expert North African rabbi advised that, to make it more appetizing, the unusual
dish be covered with honey, like a home-made sweet (25). The magical and empirical tradition linked to the foreskin of circumcision as a
fecundating element was not lost over the course of the centuries, but was protected by the secrets of the practical Cabbalah despite the
disdainful opposition of rationalistic rabbis.
It was a common belief that the Jews used blood in powders, dried or diluted in wine or water, applying it to the eyes of the new-born, to
facilitate their opening, and to bathe the bodies of the dying, to facilitate their entry into the Garden of Eden (26). Samuel Fleischaker, Israel
Wolfgang's friend, indicted for the ritual murder at Regensburg in 1467, attributed infallible magical properties to young blood, which,
spread on the eyes, was said to have served to protect from the evil eye ('ayn ha-ra') (27).
All the cases examined above, and in a great number of those present in the compendiums of the segullot, remedies and secret medications,
drawn up and disseminated by the masters of the practical Cabballah, constitute the exterior use, so to speak, of blood, whether human or
animal, dried or diluted, for therapeutic and exorcistic purposes. But the accusation leveled Jews of ingesting blood, or of using it for ritual or
curative purposes, in transfusions taken orally, appears at first glance destitute of any basis, being in clear violation of Biblical norms and
later ritual practices, which permitted no derogation whatever from the prohibition.
It is not, therefore, surprising that the Jews of the Duchy of Milan, in their petition to Gian Galeazzo Maria Sforza in May dated 1479,
intended to defend themselves from the ritual murder accusations spreading like oil on water after the Trent murder, by recalling the Biblical
prohibition in stressing that these accusations had no basis in fact:
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"That they are not guilty is easily proven by very effective proofs and arguments, both legal and natural, from very trustworthy authorities,
first for the Jewish Law Moysaycha which prohibits murder, and in several places, the eating of blood, not only human but of any animal
whatever" (28).
Also the most authoritative among the accused in the Trent trial, Mosè da Würzburg, kown as "the Old Man", in the initial phases of his
interrogation, did not hesitate to mention the rigid Biblical prohibition against consuming any type of blood to demonstrate the absurdity of
the accusation. "Ten Commandments given by God to Moses", the learned Hebrew leveled at this accusers, "commands us to refrain from
killing and eating blood; it is for this reason that Jews cut the throat of the beasts which they intend to eat and, what is more, later salt the
meat to eliminate any trace of blood" (29). Mosè "the Old Man" was very obviously perfectly well aware of the norms of slaughter
(shechitah) and of the salting of meat (melikhah), prescribed by Jewish rituals (halakhah) and which apply the Mosaic prohibition against
eating blood with the maximum severity. But his arguments, as we shall see, although apparently convincing, were to some degree
misleading.
In fact, if we turn once again to the compendia of segullot in use among Jews of German origin, we will find a broad range of recipes
providing for the oral ingestion of blood, both human and animal. These recipes are stupendous electuaries, sometimes complex in
preparation, intended to cure ailments and bring about cures, as well as to protect and to cure. For Shabbatai Lipschütz, to arrest the
excessive flow of menstrual blood, it was advisable to dry before the fire and reduce into power a chicken feather soaked with the menstrual
blood. The morning afterwards, a spoonful of that powder, diluted in wine and served up to the woman, on an empty stomach, was said to
have infallibly produced the desired effect. Another secret medication, collected by Lipschütz and considered of extraordinary effectiveness
on the basis of long tradition, was prescribed for women who wished to get pregnant. The recipe provided that a pinch of dried rabbit s blood [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]