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precursor of the subsequent Temple ritual. We recall the actions of the Jew Meshullam ben Isaac in
Worms, who re-created the Abraham-Isaac paradigm with his own son Isaac. Noting the parallel of the
biblical Isaac and the Worms Isaac, both born to aged mothers, he pursues the parallel by suggesting
that he too would "offer him up as did Abraham our father with his son Isaac."[60] He then went
beyond the act of his ancestor, actually slaughtering the lad, since no divine stay of execution
intervened. The image of the akedah of Abraham's binding of his son Isaac recurs regularly. "Ask
and see! Was there ever such a multiple akedah as this, from the days of the first Adam?"[61]
The spatial dimensions of the tale are drastically expanded from the narrow confines of the
Rhineland eastward to the Holy Land and the Holy City. In fact, these spatial dimensions are expanded
yet farther, to the cosmos in its entirety. Upon depicting the victorious entry of Count Emicho's
crusading force into the archbishop's courtyard in Mainz, a prelude to the slaughter of the Jews
gathered therein, the Mainz Anonymous breaks forth into a dirge: "Sun and moon, why did you not
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hide your light? You stars, to whom Israel had been compared, and you twelve planets, like the
number of the tribes of Israel, the sons of Jacob, how is it that your light was not hidden, so that it not
shine on the enemy intending to blot out the name of Israel?"[62]
Indeed, the boundaries of the tale extended even beyond the physical universe. In describing the
destruction of the group of Jews who had sought safety in the palace of the Mainz burgrave, the Mainz
Anonymous quickly tells the story of a Jew named Moses bar Helbo, who addressed his two sons with
the following: "My sons Helbo and Simon, at this moment hell beckons and paradise beckons. Into
which do you wish to enter?"[63]
The sense of contrasting outcomes eternal punishment on the one hand and eternal reward on
the other abounds throughout the narrative. Let us note the aggressive challenge flung out by the
Jew David ha-gabbai of Mainz to the crowd that had gathered to witness his insincerely promised
conversion: "If you kill me,[64] my soul will repose in paradise, in the light of life; you, however, will
descend to the pit of
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destruction, to everlasting infamy, where you will be judged with your deity, who was born of lust and
who was crucified."[65] Like the more restricted distinction between the crusaders' vain imagery of
Jerusalem and the Jewish commitment to the truly sacred Jerusalem, when contemplating life after
death the author of the Mainz Anonymous and his protagonists regularly contrast the hellish end
designed for Christians and the glorious rewards intended for the Jewish martyrs of 1096.
Just as there is an extended spatial plane reflected in the Mainz Anonymous, so too is there an
extended temporal dimension. The Jewish heroes of 1096 are regularly compared to great figures from
the Jewish past. The closest in time are the postdestruction victims of the Hadrianic decrees, such
giant figures as Rabbi Akiba and his fellow martyrs. The timeline is pushed backward to the destruction
of the Second Temple, which as we have seen is highlighted throughout the narrative. From the
period prior to the destruction of the Second Temple, we encounter reference, in the lengthy and
moving Rachel of Mainz episode, to the female martyr the mother of the seven sons of the
Antiochene persecution.[66] The Abraham figure, which played such a striking role in the
martyrological thought of 1096, hearkens to an even earlier time.
As noted, the first break in the spare Mainz Anonymous account comes in the depiction of the
initial attack in Worms, the assault on those Jews who had chosen to remain in their homes under the
protection of friendly burghers. After describing a ruse that moved the mob to anti-Jewish violence,
our author recounts the slaughter of almost all those Jews who had elected to remain in their homes.
He depicts them as having died for the sanctification of God's Name,
which is awesome and exalted for all ages. He rules above and below. He was and will be, the Lord of hosts is his Name.
He is crowned through the designation of seventy-two appellations. He created the Torah nine hundred seventy-four
generations prior to the creation of the world. There were twenty-six generations from the creation [of the world] down
to Moses the progenitor of the prophets. Through him [Moses] the holy Torah was given. Moses came and wrote in it:
"You have affirmed this day that the Lord [is your God, that you will walk in his ways, that you will observe his laws and
commandments and rules, and that you will obey him. And the Lord has affirmed this day that you are, as he promised
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