Anti-Semitic art? Or historical treasure? Wittenberg Judensau is saved.

The famous Judensau (Jews' sow) relief sculpture at Martin Luther's church in Wittenberg, Germany has been spared by a court from being taken down. It's an example of folk art that appeared first during the 13th century in Europe, and remained popular for over 600 years.

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By Carolyn Yeager

THE ABOVE IMAGE IS THE MOST FAMOUS EXAMPLE of the Judensau in Germany. Since 1305, it has adorned the State Church of Wittenberg where Martin Luther nailed his “95 theses” to the door in 1517. German Jews have since 1988 been on a campaign to remove and destroy such ancient artwork because, for them, it is offensive. Many churches have complied with Jewish wishes and removed their own Judensau sculptures, woodcuts and engravings.

In the example of the Wittenberg church, the case was brought by an unidentified member of the local Jewish community. But a county court has ruled that, since the relief sculpture is part of a UNESCO World Heritage site, it cannot be touched. The church was given World Heritage status because it is the site of the first-ever celebration of mass in German instead of Latin. Sadly, other churches do not have that protection.

Luther mentioned this specific sculpture on the church in his 1543 book Vom Schem Hamphoras, in which he compares Jewish people to the devil. He wrote:

"Here in Wittenberg at our parish church a sow is carved in stone. There are young piglets and Jews lying underneath, sucking. Behind the sow there is a rabbi, who lifts the sow's right leg up and with his left hand he pulls the tail over himself, bends down and looks with great diligence at the sow under the tail into the Talmud, as if he wanted to read and see something sharp and special. There they certainly have their shem of Hamphorah... So the Germans talk about someone who pretends to be very clever without any reason: Where did he read it? In the butt of a sow ..." .

What is the meaning of those words? At the website “Christian and Jew” we read:

One of the most famous representations is the sandstone relief on the south-east pillar of the town church of Wittenberg. The later-added inscription "Rabini, Schem Ha Mphoras" above the “Judensau" refers to Jewish mysticism, in which statements about the nature of God were derived from combinations of numbers and words. The sequence of letters of "Shem Ha Mphoras" (= the undisguised name) possessed miraculous powers according to the belief of the Jewish Kabbalists. It was therefore regarded as particularly holy and was hidden from the uncalled. This probably refers to the unpronounceable holy name of God. So the headline above the Judensau picture reads: "This is what the inexpressible holy name of the God of the Rabbi [Jewish God] looks like".

From Wikipedia:

The image appears in the Middle Ages, mostly in carvings on church or cathedral walls, often outside where it could be seen from the street (for example at Wittenberg and Regensburg), but also in other forms. The earliest appearance seems to be on the underside of a wooden choir-stall seat in Cologne Cathedral, dating to about 1210. The earliest example in stone dates to ca. 1230 and is located in the cloister of the cathedral at Brandenburg. In about 1470 the image appeared in woodcut form, and thereafter was often copied in popular prints.

But if the Jews have their way, there will be fewer and fewer until they are all gone, and this part of history will be lost to us—due to 'one-way' political correctness and the ever-growing demand to wipe out all “anti-Semitism”. There is plenty that Jews produce that is offensive to Christians, Europeans, and Germans in particular, but our people do not go to court to object to it. Why not, we should ask. Much, if not most of it is produced by Jews. Much of it is pornographic, and utterly despicable, such as the well-publicized Crucifix floating in a jar of urine, at one time presented as 'art' and displayed in art museums. That is just one example out of many. Christian clergy today overlook all of these insults, and instead direct their moral outrage to defending perceived attacks on Jewish people and the Jewish religion!

Here are a few examples of other Judensau artwork that has survived. May God preserve it.

Judensau in the Collegiate Church in Bad Wimpfen

Judensau at the Cathedral of St. Peter in Regensburg.

Judensau in the Cathedral of St. Martin in Colmar

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In 1215 the IV Lateran Council initiated the social isolation of the Jews. It demanded that Jews and "Saracens" (Arabs and Muslims) should bear a distinctive mark. As a result, Jews were obliged to wear a yellow or red Jewish hat and a yellow ring on their mantle (collar), Jewish women a ribbon on their bonnet and a yellow ring on their mantle. Jews were thought to be guilty of the plague, host (sacrament) desecration and ritual murder. Sometimes the motif of the "Judensau" was also associated with ritual murder legends (murder of Christian children by Jews). In the Middle Ages the Jews were only grudgingly tolerated by their Christian environment, often persecuted and expelled. 

The "Judensau" motif insults Jews and their religion in several ways:

a. The pig is an unclean (unkosher) animal for Jews (Leviticus 11:7). All contact with him is avoided. The consumption of pig meat and fat or even pig milk is an abomination to Jews. The religious feelings of Jews are hurt. In antiquity, people tried to force Jews to eat pork when persecuting them (2 Maccabees 7:1+2).

b. An intimate relationship with an animal (sodomy) is a mockery for Jews and Christians alike.

c. The almost family relationship between pig and Jews makes the observer think of a kinship between the Jews and the pig, the Jews being of a completely different kind than the Christians.

d. Jews are accused in such pictures of a reference to debauchery and sin. It is suggested that dealing with their religion is "filth".

e. In some representations the pig has the tusks of a boar and at the same time the udders of a sow. This is probably an allusion to the alleged absurdity of the Jewish religion. Christian theologians of the Middle Ages often denigrated the Jewish religion as unreasonable and stupid.

f. The depiction of Jews sitting backwards on a pig [as here] is supposed to show the alleged "wrongness" of Judaism.

We know that the common people of that time were illiterate, and were given religious instruction through pictures, statues and word of mouth. Clearly the judensau was intended to instruct the Christian faithful not to associate with Jews.