‘All shall we well’ … Julian of Norwich depicted in a window in Saint Julian’s Church, Norwich (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)
Patrick Comerford
We have come to the end of Lent and Holy Week. Yesterday was Good Friday (29 March 2024) and tomorrow is Easter Day (31 March 2024).
Throughout Lent this year, I have taken time each morning to reflect on the lives of early, pre-Reformation English saints commemorated in Common Worship.
Later this evening, I hope to be involved in the Easter Vigil Mass prayers in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford.
But, before this day begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:
1, A reflection on two early, pre-Reformation English saints;
2, today’s Gospel reading;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.
The Church of Saint Julian in Norwich, where Julian of Norwich lived as an anchorite (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)
Early English pre-Reformation saints: 46, Julian of Norwich and Margery Kempe
Julian of Norwich is remembered in Common Worship as a Spiritual Writer on 8 May and Margery Kempe is remembered as a Mystic on 9 November.
On 8 May 1373, when she was 30 years old and suffering from what was considered to be a terminal illness, a woman of Norwich, whose own name is unrecorded, experienced a series of 16 visions, that revealed aspects of the love of God. Following her recovery. She spent the next 20 years of her life pondering their meaning and recorded her conclusions in The Revelations of Divine Love, which became the first book written by a woman in English.
At some point in her life, she became an anchorite attached to the Church of Saint Julian in Norwich, which I visited earlier this week. She became known by the name of Julian to later generations. She died ca 1417.
Margery Kempe was born in Bishop’s Lynn, now King’s Lynn, in Norfolk in the late 14th century and was a contemporary of Julian of Norwich. She received many visions, several of them of the holy family, one of the most regular being of the crucifixion. She also had conversations with the saints. She was much sought after as a visionary, was endlessly in trouble with the Church, rebuked by the Archbishop, and was more than once imprisoned.
Following the messages in her visions, she went on pilgrimage to many holy places, including Walsingham, Canterbury, Compostela, Rome and Jerusalem, often setting out penniless. She was blessed with the gift of tears and seems to have been favoured with singular signs of Christ’s love, whereby for long periods she enjoyed consciousness of a close communion with him and developed a strong compassion for the sins of the world.
Her autobiography, The Book of Margery Kempe, recounts her remarkable life, and is often thought of as the oldest example of an autobiography in the English language. She died in the mid-15th century.
‘The Book of Margery Kempe’ is the oldest example of an autobiography in the English language
John 19: 38-42 (NRSVA):
38 After these things, Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, though a secret one because of his fear of the Jews, asked Pilate to let him take away the body of Jesus. Pilate gave him permission; so he came and removed his body. 39 Nicodemus, who had at first come to Jesus by night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, weighing about a hundred pounds. 40 They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in linen cloths, according to the burial custom of the Jews. 41 Now there was a garden in the place where he was crucified, and in the garden there was a new tomb in which no one had ever been laid. 42 And so, because it was the Jewish day of Preparation, and the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there.
‘Jesus is laid in the tomb’ … Station 14 in Saint Julian’s Church, Norwich (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)
Today’s Prayers (Saturday 30 March 2024):
The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), has been ‘Holy Week Reflection.’ This theme was introduced last Sunday by the Revd Canon Dr Peniel Rajkumar, Theologian and Director of Global Mission, USPG.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (30 March 2024) invites us to pray in these words:
Lord, may we be active members of the community and welcome the stranger into our churches.
The Collect:
Grant, Lord,
that we who are baptized into the death
of your Son our Saviour Jesus Christ
may continually put to death our evil desires
and be buried with him;
and that through the grave and gate of death
we may pass to our joyful resurrection;
through his merits,
who died and was buried and rose again for us,
your Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
Additional Collect:
In the depths of our isolation
we cry to you, Lord God:
give light in our darkness
and bring us out of the prison of our despair;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Yesterday: Walter Hilton of Thurgarton
Tomorrow: Easter Day
‘The Book of Margery Kempe’ is an autobiographical account of her remarkable life
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
30 March 2024
Daily prayer in Lent with
early English saints:
46, 30 March 2024,
Julian of Norwich and Margery Kempe
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Three memorials
mark the sites of
the mediaeval Jewish
cemetery in Oxford
‘May their memory be blessed’ … three plaques remember the mediaeval Jewish cemetery in Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Patrick Comerford
I recently walked along ‘Deadman’s Walk’, the footpath from Christ Church Meadows to the Rose Garden and the Botanic Gardens in Oxford. This pathway linked the mediaeval Jewry along what is now St Aldates in Oxford to the mediaeval Jewish cemetery by the banks of the Cherwell, and to this day it is known as Deadman’s Walk.
During those walks, I also visited three plaques erected in recent decades that mark the site of the mediaeval Jewish cemetery at the Rose Garden by the Botanic Garden and in Saint John’s Quad in Magdalen College.
Jews first arrived in England with the Norman Conquest in 1066, and 20 years later the Domesday Book in 1086 recorded a Jew living in Oxfordshire in 1086. What is now known as St Aldate’s then became known as Great Jewry Street, and a nearby street was called Little Jewry Lane. Many Jewish homes were in close proximity, indicating Oxford had a flourishing Jewish community.
The presence of this Jewish community is shown in the existence of a synagogue on Great Jewry Street, founded by Copin of Worcester in 1228. This is now the site of the Archdeacon’s house in Christ Church College.
The mediaeval Jewish cemetery in Oxford was first laid out on land bought by the Jewish community in the meadows by the Cherwell River after 1177. The site lay just outside the East Gate of the ancient city walls.
For many years, the Jews of England were prohibited from burying their dead outside London and they had to bring them to London to be buried in the Jewish cemetery outside Cripplegate, on Jewin Street, known then as ‘Jews’ Garden’.
This restriction continued until 1177, when Henry II allowed Jews to acquire burial sites outside London. However, it is not known when Jews began burying their dead in Oxford. When Gedaliyah ben Moses of Wallingford (‘Deus-eum-crescat’) died ca 1188, his body was taken to London for burial, which indicates the cemetery had not yet been laid out by 1188.
The site of the medieval Jewish cemetery was later acquired by Magdalen College (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
At some time between 1188 and 1231, the members of the Jewish community in Oxford began burying their dead members on land between the East Gate and the Cherwell River. This site, representing the part of High Street that runs between Longwall Street and Magdalen Bridge, was acquired with royal approval.
The site of the Jewish cemetery in Oxford was reduced in 1231, when Henry III granted the part of the burial site on the north side of the High Street to Hospital of Saint John the Baptist. The hospital appears in the records in 1181, and it was granted the land of the ‘Garden of the Jews’ to build a hospital in 1231, on condition that a piece of land measuring 300 ft by 90 ft on the south side of High Street was retained for Jewish burials.
A small area of the meadows, near the present Rose Garden, remained as the Jewish burial ground until 1290, when all Jews were expelled from England under Edward I. The site of the former cemetery is now represented by part of Magdalen College and by a portion of the Botanic Gardens.
A plaque marking the site of the Jewish cemetery was erected in 1931 in a corner by the Danby Gate (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
The Hospital of Saint was dissolved in 1457, when it was granted to William Waynfleet for the foundation of Magdalen College. Part of the site of the original Jewish cemetery was let out as a meadow to tenants of Magdalen College until 1621, when the Botanic Garden or Physic Garden, was founded by Henry Danvers (1573-1644), Earl Danby, a former Lord President of Munster and a cousin of the priest-poet George Herbert.
Lord Danby obtained a new lease of the meadowland site of the former Jewish cemetery from Magdalen College. The site was chosen because it was ‘aptly watered with the River Charwell.’
A mass of bones was dug up when the wall of the ‘Physic Garden’ was built between 1621 and 1633. To free the garden from flooding from the adjacent Cherwell River, the level of the garden was raised between the north wall and the bridge in 1642. The unearthing of bones during the construction of the wall and the raising of the ground suggest that even today there may be graves beneath the site.
The existence of a Jewish cemetery on the site remained widely known and the Jewish community in Oxford would pray there and recite the mourners’ Kaddish on Friday afternoons up until the 1920s.
The plaque by the Danby Gate in the Botanic Garden was inspired by Herbert Loewe (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Today, the leafy entrance to the Botanic Garden, with its serene classical-style Danby Gate and ornate Rose Garden, offers an escape from Oxford’s busy High Street. But this tranquil spot also displays two of the three plaques in Oxford commemorating the existence of a mediaeval Jewish cemetery.
A plaque on the right-hand wall beside the Danby Gate at the entrance to the Botanic Garden was unveiled by the City Council in 1931. This plaque commemorates the site of the mediaeval Jewish cemetery. The plaque is in a discreet corner that makes it difficult to find and read. The inscription reads: ‘This stone marks the site of the Jewish Cemetery until 1290.’
The plaque was inspired by Herbert Loewe (1882-1940), lecturer in Semitic languages at Exeter College, Oxford, who also inspired the plaque on the site of the Town Hall, commemorating Great Jewry Street and the plaque on the former site of Osney Abbey where Haggai (Robert) of Reading, was burnt to death in 1221 as punishment for converting to Judaism and refusing to recant.
The prominent, granite memorial at the Rose Garden was erected in 2012 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
The Oxford Jewish Heritage Committee erected a second, more prominent, granite memorial to the mediaeval Jewish Community facing the Rose Garden, outside the enclosure of the walled Botanic Garden, on 4 July 2012.
The very wordy English inscription on the memorial stone gives the history of the site:
‘Beneath this stone lies a medieval cemetery.
‘Around 1190 the Jews of Oxford purchased a water meadow outside the city walls to establish a burial ground. In 1231 that land, now occupied by Magdalen College, was appropriated by the Hospital of St John, and a small section of wasteland, where this memorial lies, was given to the Jews for a new cemetery.
‘An ancient footpath linked the cemetery with the medieval Jewish quarter along Great Jewry Street, now St Aldate’s. For over 800 years, this path has been called ‘Deadman’s Walk’, a name that bears silent witness to a community that contributed to the growth of this City and University throughout the 12th and 13th centuries.
‘In 1290 all the Jews were expelled from England by King Edward I. They were not permitted to return for over 350 years.
‘May their memory be blessed.’
The tablet in the paving in Saint John’s Quad, Magdalen College, was placed in 2019 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Another part of the original Jewish cemetery is the site of the Tower and part of the south side of Magdalen College. Human bones were found in Magdalen College during building works in 2016-2017 on the site of the mediaeval kitchen. They indicated the further reaches of the site of the mediaeval Jewish cemetery. Magdalen College later erected a tablet in memory of the Jewish people who were buried there, and who were reburied on 20 June 2019.
The plaque set into the paving in Saint John’s Quad to mark the discovery reads:
‘The site of the first Oxford Jewish Cemetery c. 1190 – 1231
‘The remains of unknown souls were found here in 2016.’
זכרונו\ה\ם\ן לברכה, May their memories be a blessing
Shabbat Shalom
The mediaeval Jewish cemetery in Oxford was first laid out on land by the Cherwell River (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Patrick Comerford
I recently walked along ‘Deadman’s Walk’, the footpath from Christ Church Meadows to the Rose Garden and the Botanic Gardens in Oxford. This pathway linked the mediaeval Jewry along what is now St Aldates in Oxford to the mediaeval Jewish cemetery by the banks of the Cherwell, and to this day it is known as Deadman’s Walk.
During those walks, I also visited three plaques erected in recent decades that mark the site of the mediaeval Jewish cemetery at the Rose Garden by the Botanic Garden and in Saint John’s Quad in Magdalen College.
Jews first arrived in England with the Norman Conquest in 1066, and 20 years later the Domesday Book in 1086 recorded a Jew living in Oxfordshire in 1086. What is now known as St Aldate’s then became known as Great Jewry Street, and a nearby street was called Little Jewry Lane. Many Jewish homes were in close proximity, indicating Oxford had a flourishing Jewish community.
The presence of this Jewish community is shown in the existence of a synagogue on Great Jewry Street, founded by Copin of Worcester in 1228. This is now the site of the Archdeacon’s house in Christ Church College.
The mediaeval Jewish cemetery in Oxford was first laid out on land bought by the Jewish community in the meadows by the Cherwell River after 1177. The site lay just outside the East Gate of the ancient city walls.
For many years, the Jews of England were prohibited from burying their dead outside London and they had to bring them to London to be buried in the Jewish cemetery outside Cripplegate, on Jewin Street, known then as ‘Jews’ Garden’.
This restriction continued until 1177, when Henry II allowed Jews to acquire burial sites outside London. However, it is not known when Jews began burying their dead in Oxford. When Gedaliyah ben Moses of Wallingford (‘Deus-eum-crescat’) died ca 1188, his body was taken to London for burial, which indicates the cemetery had not yet been laid out by 1188.
The site of the medieval Jewish cemetery was later acquired by Magdalen College (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
At some time between 1188 and 1231, the members of the Jewish community in Oxford began burying their dead members on land between the East Gate and the Cherwell River. This site, representing the part of High Street that runs between Longwall Street and Magdalen Bridge, was acquired with royal approval.
The site of the Jewish cemetery in Oxford was reduced in 1231, when Henry III granted the part of the burial site on the north side of the High Street to Hospital of Saint John the Baptist. The hospital appears in the records in 1181, and it was granted the land of the ‘Garden of the Jews’ to build a hospital in 1231, on condition that a piece of land measuring 300 ft by 90 ft on the south side of High Street was retained for Jewish burials.
A small area of the meadows, near the present Rose Garden, remained as the Jewish burial ground until 1290, when all Jews were expelled from England under Edward I. The site of the former cemetery is now represented by part of Magdalen College and by a portion of the Botanic Gardens.
A plaque marking the site of the Jewish cemetery was erected in 1931 in a corner by the Danby Gate (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
The Hospital of Saint was dissolved in 1457, when it was granted to William Waynfleet for the foundation of Magdalen College. Part of the site of the original Jewish cemetery was let out as a meadow to tenants of Magdalen College until 1621, when the Botanic Garden or Physic Garden, was founded by Henry Danvers (1573-1644), Earl Danby, a former Lord President of Munster and a cousin of the priest-poet George Herbert.
Lord Danby obtained a new lease of the meadowland site of the former Jewish cemetery from Magdalen College. The site was chosen because it was ‘aptly watered with the River Charwell.’
A mass of bones was dug up when the wall of the ‘Physic Garden’ was built between 1621 and 1633. To free the garden from flooding from the adjacent Cherwell River, the level of the garden was raised between the north wall and the bridge in 1642. The unearthing of bones during the construction of the wall and the raising of the ground suggest that even today there may be graves beneath the site.
The existence of a Jewish cemetery on the site remained widely known and the Jewish community in Oxford would pray there and recite the mourners’ Kaddish on Friday afternoons up until the 1920s.
The plaque by the Danby Gate in the Botanic Garden was inspired by Herbert Loewe (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Today, the leafy entrance to the Botanic Garden, with its serene classical-style Danby Gate and ornate Rose Garden, offers an escape from Oxford’s busy High Street. But this tranquil spot also displays two of the three plaques in Oxford commemorating the existence of a mediaeval Jewish cemetery.
A plaque on the right-hand wall beside the Danby Gate at the entrance to the Botanic Garden was unveiled by the City Council in 1931. This plaque commemorates the site of the mediaeval Jewish cemetery. The plaque is in a discreet corner that makes it difficult to find and read. The inscription reads: ‘This stone marks the site of the Jewish Cemetery until 1290.’
The plaque was inspired by Herbert Loewe (1882-1940), lecturer in Semitic languages at Exeter College, Oxford, who also inspired the plaque on the site of the Town Hall, commemorating Great Jewry Street and the plaque on the former site of Osney Abbey where Haggai (Robert) of Reading, was burnt to death in 1221 as punishment for converting to Judaism and refusing to recant.
The prominent, granite memorial at the Rose Garden was erected in 2012 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
The Oxford Jewish Heritage Committee erected a second, more prominent, granite memorial to the mediaeval Jewish Community facing the Rose Garden, outside the enclosure of the walled Botanic Garden, on 4 July 2012.
The very wordy English inscription on the memorial stone gives the history of the site:
‘Beneath this stone lies a medieval cemetery.
‘Around 1190 the Jews of Oxford purchased a water meadow outside the city walls to establish a burial ground. In 1231 that land, now occupied by Magdalen College, was appropriated by the Hospital of St John, and a small section of wasteland, where this memorial lies, was given to the Jews for a new cemetery.
‘An ancient footpath linked the cemetery with the medieval Jewish quarter along Great Jewry Street, now St Aldate’s. For over 800 years, this path has been called ‘Deadman’s Walk’, a name that bears silent witness to a community that contributed to the growth of this City and University throughout the 12th and 13th centuries.
‘In 1290 all the Jews were expelled from England by King Edward I. They were not permitted to return for over 350 years.
‘May their memory be blessed.’
The tablet in the paving in Saint John’s Quad, Magdalen College, was placed in 2019 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Another part of the original Jewish cemetery is the site of the Tower and part of the south side of Magdalen College. Human bones were found in Magdalen College during building works in 2016-2017 on the site of the mediaeval kitchen. They indicated the further reaches of the site of the mediaeval Jewish cemetery. Magdalen College later erected a tablet in memory of the Jewish people who were buried there, and who were reburied on 20 June 2019.
The plaque set into the paving in Saint John’s Quad to mark the discovery reads:
‘The site of the first Oxford Jewish Cemetery c. 1190 – 1231
‘The remains of unknown souls were found here in 2016.’
זכרונו\ה\ם\ן לברכה, May their memories be a blessing
Shabbat Shalom
The mediaeval Jewish cemetery in Oxford was first laid out on land by the Cherwell River (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
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