During the Crusades

During the Crusades.

It is said that Harun al-Rashid sent the keys of Jerusalem to Charlemagne, and that under Harun various Christian buildings were erected. In 969 Mu'izz al-Din of Egypt took the city; and under Hakim (1010) certain buildings were destroyed, which were restored in 1048 by the patriarch Nicephorus. In 1077 the Seljuk Turks, under Isar al-Atsis, drove the Egyptian garrison out of Jerusalem, and 3,000 of the inhabitants of the city were slain. During the First Crusade (1098) the Turks were expelled by Egyptians after a siege lasting forty days. The walls were rebuilt, and the city was taken by the Crusaders July 15, 1099. The latter built extensively and repaired the walls in 1177. The Franks were defeated in Jerusalem in 1187 by Saladin, who is said to have invited the Jews to return to Palestine. The Haram area was reconverted into a mosque, the Dome rebuilt, and in 1192 the city walls were repaired. There are very few notices of the Jews in the city during all this time. Abraham b. Hiyya says that in his day (1136) it contained no Jew ("Monatsschrift," xlvii. 450). Yet there must have been some there, as the street in which they lived is called "Judairia" in Latin documents of the times ("Regesta Regni Hierosolymitani," ed. Röhricht, p. 109). A Petrus Judæus is mentioned as swearing allegiance to Baldwin III. on Feb. 11, 1056; and the same name occurs in a document of 1160 (ib. pp. 77, 78, 89, 95). That a yeshibah existed or was reinstituted during the first half of the tenth century is proved by the title "Rosh ha-Yeshibah" given to Ben Meïr, perhaps by Saadia himself (Schechter, "Saadyana," p. 18, lines 11, 17). He seems, also, to have had about him both a large and a small Sanhedrin ("R. E. J." xliv. 239; "Zeit. für Hebr. Bibl." vii. 147).

It was in the first half of the eleventh century that the attempt was made to revive the gaonate in Palestine. The yeshibah in Jerusalem is mentioned in the year 1031 (see also Schechter, "Saadyana," p. 18, 1. 10 [comp. "J. Q. R." xv. 96]); and in 1046 Solomon b. Judah was at its head; but upon the coming of the Seljuks it was removed to Tyre (see Jew. Encyc. v. 572a, s.v. Gaon).

A letter from Jerusalem dated 1188 seems to relate to the dire straits of the Jews, perhaps after Saladin had recaptured the city, to which event a certain passage in the letter ("Ozar tob," p. 79, 12) may refer. It is partially an alphabetic acrostic, and was given to R. Jonah b. Judah the Sephardi, who was sent out to collect money. He mentions the yeshibah, which at his time had practically ceased to exist. The Jews, though very few in number, were bound to pay the same tax which was originally laid upon them (see Berliner's "Magazin," iii. 217, iv. 233; "Ozar tob," p. 77). A fragmentary letter, referring probably to the same time, is published in Luncz, l.c. v. 67. A letter of 1137 mentions not only the assembling of the Jews in their synagogue ("Midrash Me'at"), but also their gathering together with Jews from other places on the Mount of Olives on the festivals of Sukkot and Hosha'na Rabbah, a custom otherwise attested (see Schechter, l.c. 22, 5; according to 21, 12, the dates of the festivals were promulgated on the Mount of Olives; "Sefer ha-Hasidim," p. 169, §, 630; "R. E. J." xlii. 181; Luncz, l.c. i. 65). Abraham ibn Daud (Neubauer, "M. J. C." i. 79, 7) also mentions the custom, but adds that the "Minim" (Karaites) were in tents opposite the other Jews.

Jerusalem