A JPS bestseller, this is the definitive work of scholarship on the medieval conception of the Jew as devil--literally and figuratively. Through documents, analysis, and illustrations, the book exposes the full spectrum of the Jew's demonization as devil, sorcerer, and ritual murderer. The author reveals how these myths, many with origins traced to Christian Europe in the late Middle Ages, still exist in transmuted form in the modern era.

One picture may save a thousand words but we will never know how many hundreds of thousands of lives were not saved, how many millions of lives were not even lived, because of the climate of fear and of hate prompted and promoted by the anti-Semitic pictures of Satanic horned Jews. From the 12th to the 21st century, these cartoons, simplifying and intensifying fears and hatreds, were powerful tools in the spread of anti-Semitism. These images first appeared in medieval Christianity, reappeared in 19th and 20th century Racialism, Fascism and Marxism, and today are part of the visual images of contemporary Islam; four absolutely different belief systems with different life cycles all sharing the exact same indelible meme with its exact same visual expression targeting the exact same expiatory victim. For a thousand years, the power of this fabrication has erased existential realities and, with devastating consequences, the fear generated by the image of the demonised Jew has been reflected onto the real Jew. Some of the cartoons in this book may shock our sensibilities; to many they are a vital shared social truth, to others a vile experienced reality.

A groundbreaking--and terrifying--examination of the widespread resurgence of antisemitism in the 21st century, by the prize-winning and #1 internationally bestselling author of Hitler's Willing Executioners. Antisemitism never went away, but since the turn of the century it has multiplied beyond what anyone would have predicted. It is openly spread by intellectuals, politicians and religious leaders in Europe, Asia, the Arab world, America and Africa and supported by hundreds of millions more. Indeed, today antisemitism is stronger than any time since the Holocaust. In THE DEVIL THAT NEVER DIES, Daniel Jonah Goldhagen reveals the unprecedented, global form of this age-old hatred; its strategic use by states; its powerful appeal to individuals and groups; and how technology has fueled the flames that had been smoldering prior to the millennium. A remarkable work of intellectual brilliance, moral stature, and urgent alarm, THE DEVIL THAT NEVER DIES is destined to be one of the most provocative and talked-about books of the year.

Analyzes and illustrates the demonization of women and Jews in medieval sermon stories, retelling over one hundred of these tales in modern English.

This volume engages with antisemitic stereotypes as religious symbols that express and transmit a belief system of Jew-hatred. These religious symbols are stored in Christian, Muslim and even today’s secular cultural and religious memories. This volume explores how antisemitic religious symbol systems can play a key role in the construction of group identities.