Imaginary Jews and Religious Minorities in Early Modern Rome

现代罗马早期虚构的犹太人和宗教少数派分析了罗马犹太人被迫皈依教义的情况。基于大量但以前未使用的罗马档案资料，该项目提出犹太人是罗马早期现代天主教创新者非常关注的一个类别，因此他们对于我们的理解是必要的。尤其是皈依者布道，为理解和庆祝早期现代天主教的显著特点提供了机会。更广泛地说，这个项目还提出了一种理解早期现代天主教的新方法，通过考虑它是如何被外部群体塑造的，即使是在它的核心；犹太人是许多例子之一。早期现代罗马是观察犹太人对早期现代天主教影响的独特而引人注目的实验室。罗马拥有欧洲最古老的连续犹太人定居点，早于基督教，并在16世纪迅速发展。但作为芒迪的首府，罗马也产生了关于犹太人的大部分修辞和概念，这些修辞和概念为几个世纪的天主教神学提供了信息。因此，在罗马，与欧洲其他任何地方不同，真正的犹太人和虚构的犹太人一样健壮，同样不可能被忽视，并且有同样的古代主张。在皈依的布道中，他们汇聚在一起：在一个真正的犹太会众面前，传教士提出了他们对犹太教的神学批评，就像他们想象的那样，并提出了选择天主教的理由。皈依者的布道也捕捉到了一个时刻，即宗教改革后的天主教教义和优先事项必须被大声地表达出来，并“出售”给公众。从一开始，正如档案记录所证实的那样，皈依者布道一直是一种公共奇观，不仅有犹太人和新的皈依者参加，而且还有精英神职人员、普通公民、朝圣者和外国游客参加。在特伦特会议结束后不久，罗马的皈依派布道就开始了，一直持续到近代早期。在这段时间里，一个广泛而多样的群体听到了这些布道。皈依传教士的修辞策略表明，在延续旧论点的同时，纳入了早期现代天主教的新价值观。当传教士在遥远的国度和在陌生的人群面前为天主教辩护时，皈依传教士在教会最古老的反对者面前，在天主教的内心深处提出他们的理由。因此，这个项目考虑了皈依传教固有的悖论：皈依从来不是它的唯一目标，也不是犹太人的唯一目标。从第一次开始，皈依传教面向多层次、不同的受众，因此服务于多层次、不同的功能；它对犹太-基督教关系和早期现代天主教都很重要。因此，这项研究以及由此产生的专著，对这两个领域的史学都做出了实质性的贡献。然而，在一座充斥着外国政要、新皈依者、新教旅行者、国际商人和其他人的城市里，犹太人并不是罗马唯一的宗教少数派。就像皈依的布道是为了吸引不同的信仰一样，重要的是要记住，其他宗教团体也可以影响早期现代天主教，要么以类似犹太教的方式，如外部验证，要么以其他尚未探索的方式。通过这种方式提醒我们，早期的现代天主教并不是在孤立的情况下发展起来的，而是受到其他宗教的影响，甚至在它的核心，在罗马。假想的犹太人和早期现代罗马的宗教少数派项目还将发展一个学者网络，通过讲习班、小组讨论和编辑后的文集出版，研究宗教少数派对早期现代天主教的核心影响。

Imaginary Jews and Religious Minorities in Early Modern Rome analyzes forced conversionary preaching to the Jews of Rome. Based on abundant but previously unused sources in Roman archives, this project proposes that Jews were a category of great concern to the innovators of early modern Catholicism in Rome, and that therefore they are necessary to our understanding of it. Conversionary preaching in particular provided an opportunity for understanding and celebrating the distinctive features of early modern Catholicism. More broadly, this project also proposes a new approach to understanding early modern Catholicism, by considering how it was shaped, even at its very heart, by a group external to it; Jews are one case of many. Early modern Rome was a unique and compelling laboratory for observing the impact of Jews on early modern Catholicism. Rome boasted the oldest continuous Jewish settlement in Europe, one which predated Christianity, and which grew rapidly in the sixteenth century. But as the Caput Mundi, Rome also generated most of the rhetoric and conceptions about Jews ("imaginary Jews") that had informed centuries of Catholic theology. Thus in Rome, unlike anywhere else in Europe, real Jews and imaginary Jews were equally robust, equally impossible to ignore, and had equal claims to antiquity. At conversionary sermons, they converged: Before a real Jewish congregation, preachers offered their theological critiques of Judaism as they imagined it, and made an argument for choosing Catholicism. Conversionary preaching also captures a moment when post-Reformation Catholic doctrine and priorities had to be articulated aloud and "sold" to a public. From the outset, as the archival record confirms, conversionary preaching was always a public spectacle, attended not only by Jews and new converts, but also by elite clerics, ordinary citizens, pilgrims, and foreign visitors. Conversionary preaching in Rome began shortly after the close of the Council of Trent and lasted beyond the early modern period. Throughout this period, a wide and varied group heard these sermons. The rhetorical strategies of conversionary preachers show the incorporation of early modern Catholicism's new values alongside the continuation of older arguments. While missionaries argued for Catholicism in distant lands, and before populations to whom it was unfamiliar, conversionary preachers made their case before the Church's oldest antagonists, and within the very heart of the body of Catholicism.This project thus considers the paradox inherent in conversionary preaching: that conversion was never its only goal, nor Jews its only target. From the first, conversionary preaching addressed a multilayered, diverse audience, and therefore served multilayered, diverse functions; it mattered both for Jewish-Christian relations and also for early modern Catholicism. This study, and the monograph that will result from it, therefore makes substantial contributions to the historiography of both fields. Yet in a city full of foreign dignitaries, new converts, Protestant travellers, international merchants, and others, Jews were hardly Rome's only religious minority. Just as conversionary sermons were pitched to appeal across faiths, it is important to remember that other religious groups could also influence early modern Catholicism, either in ways similar to Judaism, such as external validation, or in others yet to be explored. In this way we are reminded that early modern Catholicism did not develop in isolation but was influenced by other religions even at its heart, in Rome. The project Imaginary Jews and Religious Minorities in Early Modern Rome will also develop a network of scholars studying the impact of religious minorities at the heart of early modern Catholicism, through workshops, panels, and the publication of an edited collection.