The Crusades

The next Millennium began with the Crusades, military operations by Christian countries to capture the Holy Land.

The armies of the first Crusade attacked Jewish communities on their way to Palestine, especially in Germany.

When the Crusaders captured Jerusalem they slaughtered and enslaved thousands of Jews as well as Muslims.

Following the example of the Romans earlier, they banned Jews from the city.

In Britain, the Jewish population increased, benefiting from the protection of Henry I.

The bad times return

The 1100s were a seriously bad period. Jews were driven from southern Spain by a Berber invasion. Serious anti-Jewish incidents began to occur in Europe:

• in France Jews were accused of ritually murdering a child
• in England Jews were murdered while trying to give gifts to the King at Richard I’s coronation
• 150 Jews were massacred in York
• in 1215 the Catholic Church ordered Jews to live in segregated areas (ghettos) and to wear distinctive clothes.

Expulsions

In England the Jews faced increasing restrictions during the Thirteenth Century, and in 1290 they were all expelled from England.

Shortly afterwards the Jews were expelled from France.

In 1478 the Jews in Spain suffered under the Spanish Inquisition, and in 1492 Jews were expelled from Spain altogether. The same thing happened in Portugal in 1497.

50 years later in Germany, Martin Luther (founder of Protestant Christianity) preached viciously against the Jews.

Scholarship, literature, and mysticism

But it wasn’t an entirely bad period for Judaism. Scholarship and literature flourished, with figures like Rambam, Luria, Levi ben Gershom, and Eleazar ben Judah.

The Jewish form of mysticism, known as Kabbalah reached new heights with the publication in Spain of the Book of Splendour, which influenced Jewish Spirituality for centuries.

Source:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/judaism/history/history_1.shtml