Fierté, désespoir et mémoire : les récits juifs de la première croisade

Abstract

Pride, Despair, and Memory : The Jewish Narratives of the First Crusade. From the study of the Jewish narratives of the first crusade, which recount the massacres of Jewish communities in the Rhineland in 1096, four thematic components emerge : the concept of trial which banishes all shadow of guilt or sin, that is to say, the idea of a collective suffering experienced as an intellectual perfecting ; the memorisation of the names of the dead, a means of channeling collective memory ; the image of the Temple and of sacrifice, a sacrifice to God and to the symbolic community ; and lastly, the ritual war, a war of narratives and of insults. These narratives, the fruit of a long literary tradition and an intense religiosity, evidence a new intolerance, and a new relationship between the Jews and their God, placed under the auspices of pride.