62. Jewish Life in the Dark Ages (Jewish History Lab)

Brief overview of some of the major features of Jewish life in the so-called "Dark Ages."
Recommended reading:
Cecil Roth, ed. The World History of the Jewish People. Vol. XI (11): The Dark Ages. Jews in Christian Europe 711-1096 [Second Series: Medieval Period. Vol. Two: The Dark Ages]
Interested in studying more deeply with our Membership perks?
Join our learning community of students, researchers and colleagues: / @henryabramsonphd

[@vickistone3700]

read "the phsician" by noah gordon. a young english doctor assumes a jewish identity, joins jewish trading cravans to persia, to learn medicine there. it touches on all aspects of this lecture. terrific book

[@truthdisseminator]

Great movie too

[@timtunnel1996]

Just Google dark ages and Islam.. You'll see what we don't know before. During dark ages Islam flourishes with knowledge which becomes foundation to our modern world. I was surprised myself how this fact was hidden or untold to the public. Jews translated a lot of knowledge from Arabic into Hebrew during this era.

[@Long-Ball-Larry]

It was not hidden. This is well known among historians - I learned this in school in Germany and it is also prominent in popular literature and Hollywood movies. People just don't read books anymore.

[@PC-lu3zf]

Great lecture.

[@HenryAbramsonPhD]

Many thanks!

[@TheNaturalLawInstitute]

Abramson (All): Great series. FYI: Origin of European legal oddities is the first principle of European civilizational law: individual sovereignty. Meaning these are outlets to circumvent the problem of the absence of discretionary authority, where the exercise of any authority violates the first principle of the law and produces an incentive for retaliation against the authority. Unlike the river valley civilizations, where production, defense, policing, taxation and administration could be concentrated, Europeans couldn't produce equal political efficiency given the territory. So it took Mediterranean trade, Lotharingian trade routes, north sea trade, and Atlantic trade to pay the higher cost of political organization. Conversely, Jewish homogeneity and interdependence for survival made possible by the absence of responsibility for territorial conquest, domestication, and defense allowed the formation of collective and judicial authority without undermining the production of internal order. So, Europeans had the opposite organizing problem that originated in the west Indo-European development of a universal militia funded by families. In simplistic terms, the origin of European civilization is that of entrepreneurial warriors who merged horse, bronze, and wheel on the steppe, then used the superiority of that social and military order to conquer most of Eurasia despite the absence of centralized productivity made possible by the river valleys of the flood river civilizations. We see this in the universal consistency of the means by which pirates organize: democratic government, a division of power, and the 'corporation' of warriors. Or in trivial terms "conquerors and colonizers require different organizing principles to domesticate territory and people prior to the organization of production and trade. The 'entrepreneurship of violence' necessary for such conquest, colonization, and domestication produces a different shareholder agreement from that of the traders that follow them. We can see the limit of the hierarchy of these organizations failing in the steppe, desert, and arctic for the same reason. An analogy to the three bears. Only certain territories favor certain organizing principles. And it explains why the steppe and desert produced the waves of the conquest of river civilizations that caused the low trust civilization of the middle east by the constant rotation of power. And conversely the higher trust Indians, next higher trust of east Asians, and the highest trust of north europeans. In other words, we are all the product of our geography combined with path dependency of our founding people's organizing principles. It's kind of beautiful in retrospect.

[@marie-joelleraussou]

I find your analysis very interesting.

[@snax_4820]

Not only the Jews had their own legal system, but other communities and cities had that too.

[@sebastiaosalgado1979]

Yes, Christian communities in some Muslim countries also had an autonomous legal system, for example.

[@debrapaulino918]

So glad for this education.

[@tuvoca825]

POSSIBLE ERROR? On the map behind you, Ragusa is across from Bari. I have been to Ragusa in Sicily, near Siracusa (Syracuse in English). I am unaware of a Ragusa on the location shown on the map behind you. Is it a city with the same name or is it a map error?

[@nusbacher]

The city you’re seeing across the Adriatic from Bari is now called Dubrovnik, but it was called Ragusa in Latin and Dalmatian.

[@rbpompeu1]

Happy to live in the XXI century, but curious about the Dark Ages.

[@danielpalmer643]

T. H. White pointed out that trial by combat in which litigants could hire champions is about as fair as contemporary systems in which litigants hire lawyers. Either way, wealth has an unfair advantage. Fascinating lecture as always!

[@bpsiloam]

This is fantastic 👍

[@HenryAbramsonPhD]

Glad you think so!

[@nitaiprod5853]

This ones for Mrs. Tessier

[@annalink4351]

Concisely informative and reliably objective.

[@JaneDoe-ij4ls]

Thank you, Rabbi Abramson

[@aevoss]

thank you

[@snax_4820]

Rhone river begins in Switzerland ...

[@seandesalero6594]

Very interesting! Any theories as to why or when Jews left Italy/elsewhere and settled in Rhine/Germany?

[@derekhalpern7179]

Charlemagne liked the Jews and invited many to settle from Italy in his Kingdom along the Rhine river.

[@movingpicutres99]

When Northern Europe started to prosper they needed good administrators who could read, write, and count.

[@marie-joelleraussou]

Trade? It is one of the main trade routes between Italy and northern Europe

[@paulshealthfitness7922]

Did Jews influence Law changes in Europe?

[@Hambone3773]

Perhaps bankruptcy law with their history of sabbatical every 7 years and Jubilee every 50?

[@debrapaulino918]

@@Hambone3773 Ask Dr. Abramson what he thinks.

[@yahsworld2940]

From what I know so far, this was the hardest period for the Jewish people before the Holocaust.

[@juliejohnson1663]

Exactly what I wanted.

[@Zollaho]

Ok, but seperating jewish history from that of a main civilization seems pointless. There is no rivalry. European history has a Middle Ages section, only because there was enlightment beforehand, then the oustanding Renaissance awterwards, a High never reached by any other Civilization. In all spheres : Science, Arts, Philosophy, Literature. Jews took a part, rather minor at the beginning. The Rabbinic culture, however great and advaced, wasn't competing. Besides, not all of European Civilization was backward at the time. Lawlessness or primitive law defined some parts of Europe, but was was not mainstream or lasting. The Church generally opposed Barbarity.

[@debrapaulino918]

Just a thought but one that holds me to it. It is the loss of the Great Library in Alexandria by fire. 1000s of papyri on every subject including the sacred perished. The Synagogue was also razed which had the original Septuagint by the 72 Rabbis. 3rd century BC. Can you imagine? Maybe knowledge of the Great Pyramid and sphinx construction and who built them was lost. Perhaps the flourishing in some areas during Dark Ages was some catch up by collective consciousness.

[@theunapologeticjew]

What is it you who dislike his videos dislike in them? The one common denominator is his and our existence. That’s the height of antisemitism 😞

[@Hambone3773]

154 likes to 4 dislikes as of now.

[@asmrnaturecat984]

every videos in youtube has dislike some people wake up in the morning just to dislike any new video pop up in their feed as for the term anti-Semitic, its very wrongly used (iraqi,syrian,yemeni, labenon are semitics as well) its like when a person dislike a hyena, he get labelled as anti-Mammalia

[@debrapaulino918]

I am always amazed myself, not just Dr. Abramson's, but so many others teaching truth. Same.

[@StArLioN_]

It was “dark” to them cause the Moors ruled Europe and civilized it.

[@HenryAbramsonPhD]

See later revisions of this lecture

[@nancyapple7631]

Today I learned when we started in the schmatta trade 😎

[@Qraze69]

whats that, the slave trade?

[@aco-alexnikolov6741]

THE COUNTRY NAME ARABIA HAS ANY TO DO WITH THE NAME RABBI?!!AY...MIGHT////

[@theunapologeticjew]

Rab is Arabic is related to the Hebrew word Rabbi. No association between Arabia and Rabbi

[@asmrnaturecat984]

rabbi is from RO and BA arab(ia is english suffix) is from 'AIN RO and BA totally different word and origin