From violent acts to violent hatred: French Catholic responses to the Damascus and Dreyfus Affairs

What causes rhetorical violence to become physical? Two events in nineteenth-century France, separated by half a century, allow for a consideration of this question. In 1840, France was gripped by the so-called Damascus Affair, where members of the Jewish community in Damascus were accused of having ritually murdered a Catholic monk and his assistant. The Affair was redolent with violence: In the imagined brutal killing, in the torture of suspects, and in the reactions of the French Catholic press and its attacks on Damascus Jewry as well as on the Jews of France, as they tried to help their fellow Jews. Yet, notwithstanding the extraordinary violence of their rhetorical attacks, the language in the Catholic press did not lead to physical violence. In 1898, in contrast, France, gripped by the Dreyfus Affair, was rocked by violent antisemitic riots that broke out across the country. The chapter explores how the events of 1898 might shed light on why the hateful, angry, and antisemitic writings in response to the Damascus Affair did not result in physical violence.