Compiled from four works of Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet (Discours sur l’Histoire Universelle, Garnier-Flammarion 1966 ed.; Discours sur l’Histoire Universelle, Tomes I & II, Lyon 1813 ed., including Continuation jusqu’à l’an 1700; Oraisons funèbres · Sermons · Maximes et Réflexions sur la Comédie, La Renaissance du Livre ed.). All passages are direct quotations from the scanned texts. Line numbers refer to the respective uploaded file. Translations are provided immediately after each French original.
Preface: The Shape of the Corpus
Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet (1627–1704), Bishop of Meaux and preceptor to the Dauphin, did not write a dedicated adversus Judaeos treatise. His anti-Jewish passages are distributed across his apologetic, historical, homiletic, and polemical writings and operate in five registers:
- Pharisaic corruption — the Pharisees as the historical agents who corrupted Mosaic religion from within and led the Jewish people into the spiritual blindness that culminated in the rejection of Christ.
- Caecitas / obstinatio Judaeorum — the patristic theme of Jewish blindness and obstinacy: the Jews who witnessed prophecy fulfilled refused to see it, and who persist in unbelief to the present day.
- Deicide and bloodguilt — the crucifixion as the greatest crime in history (le déicide), with its attendant bloodguilt (Son sang soit sur nous et sur nos enfants) as the formal cause of subsequent divine punishment.
- Supersessionism — the Jewish people definitively replaced by the Church as the true Israel; the Gentiles becoming les vrais Juifs; Judea and the Jews rendered theologically void.
- Jewish dispersion as providential proof — the Jews‘ miraculous survival in dispersion, stripped of temple, altar, and homeland, as a uniquely apologetic sign: they are preserved by God as living witnesses to their own condemnation, carrying in their own scriptures the prophecies that refute them.
Twenty-six verified passages are presented below, ordered thematically from the most structural to the most specific. Each entry includes the original French text, a literal English translation, the precise source citation, and an analytical note.
I. “Mêler dans la religion des superstitions indignes de lui” — The Corruption of the Pharisees
Source: File 1, lines 10399–10460 (Part II, Ch. XVII — Corruptions among the Jews; false doctrines of the Pharisees)
French
« Cependant, à la fin des temps, les Juifs mêmes qui le connaissaient, et qui étaient les dépositaires de la religion, commencèrent, tant les hommes vont toujours affaiblissant la vérité, non point à oublier le Dieu de leurs pères, mais à mêler dans la religion des superstitions indignes de lui. Sous le règne des Asmonéens, et dès le temps de Jonathas, la secte des Pharisiens commença parmi les Juifs. Ils s’acquirent d’abord un grand crédit par la pureté de leur doctrine et par l’observance exacte de la loi. […] A la fin, l’ambition se mit parmi eux. Ils voulurent gouverner, et en effet ils se donnèrent un pouvoir absolu sur le peuple : ils se rendirent les arbitres de la doctrine et de la religion, qu’ils tournèrent insensiblement à des pratiques superstitieuses, utiles à leur intérêt et à la domination qu’ils voulaient établir sur les consciences ; et le vrai esprit de la loi était prêt à se perdre. »
Translation
“Nevertheless, at the end of times, the very Jews who knew God, and who were the custodians of religion, began — so relentlessly do men weaken the truth — not to forget the God of their fathers, but to mingle into religion superstitions unworthy of him. Under the reign of the Hasmonaeans, and from the time of Jonathan, the sect of the Pharisees began among the Jews. They first acquired great credit through the purity of their doctrine and their exact observance of the law. […] In the end, ambition crept in among them. They wished to rule, and indeed they gave themselves absolute power over the people: they made themselves the arbiters of doctrine and of religion, which they imperceptibly bent toward superstitious practices, useful to their own interests and to the domination they wished to establish over consciences; and the true spirit of the law was on the verge of being lost.”
French (continued)
« A ces maux se joignit un plus grand mal, l’orgueil et la présomption ; mais une présomption qui allait à s’attribuer à soi-même le don de Dieu. Les Juifs, accoutumés à ses bienfaits, et éclairés depuis tant de siècles de sa connaissance, oublièrent que sa bonté seule les avait séparés des autres peuples, et regardèrent sa grâce comme une dette. Race élue et toujours bénie depuis deux mille ans, ils se jugèrent les seuls dignes de connaître Dieu, et se crurent d’une autre espèce que les autres hommes qu’ils voyaient privés de sa connaissance. Sur ce fondement, ils regardèrent les Gentils avec un insupportable dédain. Être sorti d’Abraham selon la chair, leur paraissait une distinction qui les mettait naturellement au-dessus de tous les autres ; et, enflés d’une si belle origine, ils se croyaient saints par nature, et non par grâce : erreur qui dure encore parmi eux. »
Translation (continued)
“To these evils was joined a greater one: pride and presumption — but a presumption that went so far as to attribute to themselves the gift of God. The Jews, accustomed to His benefits and enlightened for so many centuries by the knowledge of Him, forgot that His goodness alone had separated them from the other peoples, and they looked upon His grace as something owed to them. A chosen race, always blessed for two thousand years, they judged themselves the only ones worthy of knowing God, and believed themselves to be of a different species from the other men they saw deprived of that knowledge. On this basis, they looked upon the Gentiles with an insupportable disdain. To have descended from Abraham according to the flesh seemed to them a distinction that placed them naturally above all others; and, puffed up by so fine an origin, they believed themselves holy by nature and not by grace: an error that persists among them still.”
Note
This is Bossuet’s foundational diagnosis of Jewish spiritual failure. The passage moves in two stages: institutional (Pharisaic seizure of religious power and its corruption into superstition) and theological (the Jewish people’s collective confusion of election with natural superiority, grace with ethnic entitlement). The closing phrase — erreur qui dure encore parmi eux — is significant: Bossuet writes in the present tense, making the ancient error a living one. It directly links the ancient Pharisees to the Jews of his own seventeenth century, presenting Jewish identity as theologically static and self-condemned.
II. “Le commencement de leur décadence” — The Decline of the Jews as Sign of Their Ruin
Source: File 1, lines 10473–10550 (Part II, Ch. XVIII — The continuation of corruptions among the Jews; signal of their decline, as Zechariah had predicted)
French
« Encore que ces sentiments n’eussent point passé par décret public en dogme de la Synagogue, ils se coulaient insensiblement parmi le peuple, qui devenait inquiet, turbulent et séditieux. Enfin les divisions, qui devaient être, selon leurs prophètes, le commencement de leur décadence, éclatèrent à l’occasion des brouilleries survenues dans la maison des Asmonéens. […] C’est ici le moment fatal où l’histoire marque la première cause de la ruine des Juifs. »
Translation
“Although these sentiments had not passed by public decree into a dogma of the Synagogue, they seeped imperceptibly among the people, who became restless, turbulent, and seditious. At last the divisions, which according to their prophets were to be the beginning of their decline, burst forth on the occasion of the quarrels that arose in the house of the Hasmonaeans. […] This is the fatal moment which history marks as the first cause of the ruin of the Jews.”
French (continued)
« Les Pharisiens, et le peuple qui n’écoutait que leurs sentiments, souffraient cet état avec impatience. Plus ils se sentaient pressés du joug des Gentils, plus ils conçurent pour eux de dédain et de haine. Ils ne voulurent plus de Messie qui ne fût guerrier, et redoutable aux puissances qui les captivaient. Ainsi, oubliant tant de prophéties qui leur parlaient si expressément de ses humiliations, ils n’eurent plus d’yeux ni d’oreilles que pour celles qui leur annonçaient des triomphes, quoique bien différents de ceux qu’ils voulaient. »
Translation (continued)
“The Pharisees, and the people who heeded only their opinions, suffered this condition with impatience. The more they felt the yoke of the Gentiles pressing upon them, the more disdain and hatred they conceived for them. They no longer wanted a Messiah who was not a warrior, terrible to the powers that held them captive. Thus, forgetting so many prophecies that spoke to them so expressly of his humiliations, they had eyes and ears only for those that announced triumphs — though triumphs very different from the ones they desired.”
Note
Bossuet here provides a political-theological account of the Jews‘ Messianic error: their expectation of a warrior-Messiah was not innocent ignorance but a willed suppression of unflattering prophecy. The passage anticipates Bossuet’s later argument (sections X, XIV) that their unbelief was without excuse, because the evidence of prophecy was fully available to them. The detail that they selectively read the prophecies of triumph while ignoring those of humiliation is central to his apologetic: their own scriptures condemn them.
III. “Le moment était arrivé où la Synagogue devait être réprouvée” — The Rejection of Christ and the Reprobation of the Synagogue
Source: File 1, lines 10751–10784 (Part II, Ch. XIX)
French
« Les pontifes et les Pharisiens animaient contre Jésus-Christ le peuple juif, dont la religion se tournait en superstition. Ce peuple ne peut souffrir le Sauveur du monde, qui l’appelle à des pratiques solides, mais difficiles. Le plus saint et le meilleur de tous les hommes, la sainteté et la bonté même, devient le plus envié et le plus haï. Il ne se rebute pas, et ne cesse de faire du bien à ses citoyens ; mais il voit leur ingratitude ; il en prédit le châtiment avec larmes, et dénonce à Jérusalem sa chute prochaine. Il prédit aussi que les Juifs, ennemis de la vérité qu’il leur annonçait, seraient livrés à l’erreur, et deviendraient le jouet des faux prophètes. »
Translation
“The high priests and the Pharisees inflamed the Jewish people against Jesus Christ, whose religion was turning into superstition. This people cannot bear the Saviour of the world, who calls them to solid but difficult practices. The holiest and the best of all men, holiness and goodness itself, becomes the most envied and the most hated. He is not discouraged, and does not cease doing good to his fellow citizens; but he sees their ingratitude; he predicts its chastisement with tears, and announces to Jerusalem its imminent fall. He also predicts that the Jews, enemies of the truth he was proclaiming to them, would be given over to error, and would become the plaything of false prophets.”
French (continued)
« Cependant la jalousie des Pharisiens et des prêtres le mène à un supplice infâme ; ses disciples l’abandonnent ; un d’eux le trahit ; le premier et le plus zélé de tous le renie trois fois. Accusé devant le conseil, il honore jusqu’à la fin le ministère des prêtres, et répond en termes précis au pontife qui l’interrogeait juridiquement. Mais le moment était arrivé où la Synagogue devait être réprouvée. Le pontife et tout le conseil condamne Jésus-Christ parce qu’il se disait le Christ Fils de Dieu. Il est livré à Ponce Pilate, président romain ; son innocence est reconnue par son juge, que la politique et l’intérêt font agir contre sa conscience : le juste est condamné à mort : le plus grand de tous les crimes donne lieu à la plus parfaite obéissance qui fut jamais. »
Translation (continued)
“But the jealousy of the Pharisees and priests leads him to an infamous punishment; his disciples abandon him; one of them betrays him; the first and most zealous of all denies him three times. Accused before the council, he honours the ministry of the priests to the last, and answers in precise terms the high priest who was interrogating him judicially. But the moment had come when the Synagogue was to be reprobated. The high priest and the whole council condemn Jesus Christ because he called himself Christ the Son of God. He is handed over to Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor; his innocence is recognised by his judge, who is moved to act against his conscience by politics and self-interest: the just man is condemned to death. The greatest of all crimes gives rise to the most perfect obedience that ever was.”
French (continued)
« A ce mot [Tout est consommé], tout change dans le monde ; la loi cesse, ses figures passent, ses sacrifices sont abolis par une oblation plus parfaite. »
Translation (continued)
“At this word [It is finished], everything changes in the world; the Law ceases, its figures pass away, its sacrifices are abolished by a more perfect oblation.”
Note
The phrase le moment était arrivé où la Synagogue devait être réprouvée is one of Bossuet’s most theologically concentrated formulations. The reprobation of the Synagogue is presented not as a contingent historical outcome but as a divinely scheduled moment — le moment était arrivé — built into the providential order from the beginning. The passage also deploys the classic adversus Judaeos contrast: Christ acts with perfect charity toward those who destroy him, while the Jewish leaders act from jealousy, self-interest, and political calculation. The final phrase — the Law abolished by a more perfect oblation — is the supersessionist conclusion of the entire sequence.
IV. “Chassés de leur terre, et esclaves par tout l’univers” — Jewish Malice, Divine Vengeance, and the Fall of Jerusalem
Source: File 1, lines 11686–11744 (Part II, Ch. XX)
French
« Les Juifs, par leur malice obstinée, attirent la vengeance de Dieu, et avancent les maux extrêmes dont ils étaient menacés. »
Translation
“The Jews, by their obstinate malice, draw down upon themselves the vengeance of God, and hasten the extreme evils with which they were threatened.”
French (continued)
« Il lui découvre le secret profond de la vocation des Gentils par la réprobation des Juifs ingrats, qui se rendent de plus en plus indignes de l’Evangile. »
Translation (continued)
“[God] reveals to him [Paul] the deep secret of the calling of the Gentiles through the reprobation of the ungrateful Jews, who make themselves ever more unworthy of the Gospel.”
French (continued)
« La fureur et la jalousie transporte les Juifs ; ils font des complots terribles contre saint Paul, outrés principalement de ce qu’il prêche les Gentils, et les amène au vrai Dieu : ils le livrent enfin aux Romains, comme ils leur avaient livré Jésus-Christ. »
Translation (continued)
“Fury and jealousy seize the Jews; they form terrible conspiracies against Saint Paul, incensed chiefly because he preaches to the Gentiles and brings them to the true God: they finally deliver him to the Romans, just as they had delivered Jesus Christ to them.”
French (continued)
« Cependant le temps approchait où la vengeance divine devait éclater sur les Juifs impénitents : le désordre se met parmi eux ; un faux zèle les aveugle, et les rend odieux à tous les hommes ; leurs faux prophètes les enchantent par les promesses d’un règne imaginaire. Séduits par leurs tromperies, ils ne peuvent plus souffrir aucun empire légitime, et ne donnent aucunes bornes à leurs attentats. Dieu les livre au sens réprouvé. Ils se révoltent contre les Romains, qui les accablent ; Tite même, qui les ruine, reconnaît qu’il ne fait que prêter sa main à Dieu irrité contre eux. Adrien achève de les exterminer. Ils périssent avec toutes les marques de la vengeance divine : chassés de leur terre, et esclaves par tout l’univers, ils n’ont plus ni temple, ni autel, ni sacrifice, ni pays ; et on ne voit en Juda aucune forme de peuple. »
Translation (continued)
“Meanwhile the time was approaching when divine vengeance was to break out upon the impenitent Jews: disorder sets in among them; a false zeal blinds them and makes them hateful to all men; their false prophets enchant them with promises of an imaginary kingdom. Seduced by their deceits, they can no longer endure any legitimate authority, and set no limits to their crimes. God delivers them to a reprobate mind. They revolt against the Romans, who crush them; Titus himself, who ruins them, acknowledges that he is merely lending his hand to God enraged against them. Hadrian completes their extermination. They perish bearing all the marks of divine vengeance: driven from their land, and slaves throughout the universe, they have no more temple, no altar, no sacrifice, no country; and in Judah one sees no form of a people.”
Note
This passage operates in a deliberate historical cascade: Jewish malice → reprobation of the Jews → calling of the Gentiles → Jewish conspiracies against Paul (repeating the pattern of the Passion) → divine vengeance → total dispossession. The phrase Dieu les livre au sens réprouvé (God delivers them to a reprobate mind) is drawn directly from Romans 1:28, transferring Paul’s condemnation of pagan vice to the Jewish nation as a whole. Titus’s acknowledgement that he is merely God’s instrument is rhetorically crucial: it absorbs the Roman conquest into the providential narrative, making pagan military power the instrument of Christian theology.
V. “Les Gentils… deviennent dorénavant les vrais Juifs” — Supersessionism: The Jews Replaced by a New People
Source: File 1, lines 11754–11826 (Part II, Ch. XX)
French
« Il est détruit tout à fait, et le peuple juif est chassé sans espérance de la terre de ses pères. Le Messie devient l’attente des nations, and il règne sur un nouveau peuple. »
Translation
“It [the kingdom of Judah] is utterly destroyed, and the Jewish people is driven without hope from the land of its fathers. The Messiah becomes the expectation of the nations, and he reigns over a new people.”
French (continued)
« Ce qui arrive après cela aux Juifs incrédules, sous Vespasien et sous Tite, ne regarde plus la suite du peuple de Dieu. C’est un châtiment des rebelles, qui, par leur infidélité envers la semence promise à Abraham et à David, ne sont plus Juifs, ni fils d’Abraham que selon la chair, et renoncent à la promesse par laquelle les nations devaient être bénies. »
Translation (continued)
“What happens thereafter to the unbelieving Jews, under Vespasian and Titus, no longer concerns the continuation of the people of God. It is a punishment of rebels who, through their infidelity toward the seed promised to Abraham and to David, are no longer Jews, nor sons of Abraham except according to the flesh, and renounce the promise by which the nations were to be blessed.”
French (continued)
« La Judée n’est plus rien à Dieu ni à la religion, non plus que les Juifs ; et il est juste qu’en punition de leur endurcissement, leurs ruines soient dispersées par toute la terre. »
Translation (continued)
“Judea is nothing more to God or to religion, any more than the Jews are; and it is just that, in punishment of their hardening, their ruins should be scattered throughout the earth.”
French (continued)
« Ainsi cette dernière et épouvantable désolation des Juifs n’est plus une transmigration, comme celle de Babylone […] Les Gentils agrégés aux Juifs deviennent dorénavant les vrais Juifs, le vrai royaume de Juda opposé à cet Israël schismatique et retranché du peuple de Dieu, le vrai royaume de David, par l’obéissance qu’ils rendent aux lois et à l’Evangile de Jésus-Christ, fils de David. »
Translation (continued)
“Thus this last and terrible desolation of the Jews is no longer a transmigration, as that of Babylon was […] The Gentiles aggregated to the Jews henceforth become the true Jews, the true kingdom of Judah opposed to that schismatic Israel cut off from the people of God, the true kingdom of David, through their obedience to the laws and the Gospel of Jesus Christ, son of David.”
Note
This is Bossuet’s fullest statement of supersessionism. Three claims are made simultaneously: (1) the Jewish people’s dispossession is permanent and hopeless — sans espérance; (2) the unbelieving Jews are no longer properly Jews at all, but merely fils d’Abraham selon la chair; (3) the Gentile Church has inherited the name, the promises, and the identity of Israel. The phrase Israël schismatique is particularly striking: Bossuet frames post-Christian Judaism not as a prior religion but as a schism from the true Israel — a rhetorical inversion that denies Judaism any independent theological standing. The declaration that La Judée n’est plus rien à Dieu has an obvious bearing on any theology of the Holy Land.
VI. “Un spectacle éternel des jugements qu’il exerce sur ses enfants ingrats” — The Jews as Witness of Divine Judgment
Source: File 1, lines 11835–11862
French
« Il a trouvé un moyen, dont il n’y a dans le monde que ce seul exemple, de conserver les Juifs, hors de leur pays et dans leur ruine, plus longtemps même que les peuples qui les ont vaincus. On ne voit plus aucun reste ni des anciens Assyriens, ni des anciens Mèdes, ni des anciens Perses, ni des anciens Grecs, ni même des anciens Romains. La trace s’en est perdue, et ils se sont confondus avec d’autres peuples. Les Juifs, qui ont été la proie de ces anciennes nations si célèbres dans les histoires, leur ont survécu ; et Dieu, en les conservant, nous tient en attente de ce qu’il veut faire encore des malheureux restes d’un peuple autrefois si favorisé. Cependant leur endurcissement sert au salut des Gentils, and leur donne cet avantage de trouver en des mains non suspectes les Ecritures qui ont prédit Jésus-Christ et ses mystères. Nous voyons entre autres choses, dans ces Ecritures, et l’aveuglement et les malheurs des Juifs qui les conservent si soigneusement. Ainsi, nous profitons de leur disgrâce : leur infidélité fait un des fondements de notre foi ; ils nous apprennent à craindre Dieu, et nous sont un spectacle éternel des jugements qu’il exerce sur ses enfants ingrats, afin que nous apprenions à ne nous point glorifier des grâces faites à nos pères. »
Translation
“He has found a means — the only example of its kind in the world — to preserve the Jews, outside their country and in their ruin, even longer than the peoples who conquered them. No trace remains of the ancient Assyrians, the ancient Medes, the ancient Persians, the ancient Greeks, nor even the ancient Romans. Their mark has been lost, and they have merged with other peoples. The Jews, who were the prey of those once-celebrated ancient nations, have outlived them; and God, in preserving them, holds us in expectation of what he still wishes to do with the wretched remnants of a people once so favoured. Meanwhile their hardening serves the salvation of the Gentiles, and gives them the advantage of finding in hands above suspicion the Scriptures that predicted Jesus Christ and his mysteries. We see in these Scriptures, among other things, both the blindness and the misfortunes of the Jews who preserve them so carefully. Thus we profit from their disgrace: their infidelity is one of the foundations of our faith; they teach us to fear God, and are for us an eternal spectacle of the judgments he exercises upon his ungrateful children, so that we may learn not to glory in the graces bestowed upon our fathers.”
Note
This is Bossuet’s most developed statement of the apologetic argument from Jewish dispersion — the passage to which the user’s query directly refers. The argument structure is classical (found in Augustine’s City of God and the adversus Judaeos tradition broadly) but here receives one of its most rhetorically polished expressions. Three interlocking claims: (1) Jewish survival in dispersion is historically anomalous and therefore miraculous — a sign; (2) the Jews are providentially preserved as custodians of scriptures whose contents condemn themselves; (3) their ongoing misery functions as a spectacle éternel — a permanent, living demonstration of divine justice for the benefit of Christian believers. The phrase mains non suspectes (hands above suspicion) is characteristic Bossuet irony: the very enemies of the Gospel are its most trustworthy custodians precisely because they have every motive to suppress it and cannot.
VII. “Dieu est acheté trente deniers par son peuple ingrat” — The Prophecy of Zechariah: God Purchased for Thirty Denarii
Source: File 1, lines 9636–9643 (Part II, Ch. X)
French
« Un peu après ces divisions, et dans les temps de la décadence, Dieu est acheté trente deniers par son peuple ingrat ; et le prophète voit tout, jusques au champ du potier ou du sculpteur auquel cet argent est employé. De là suivent d’extrêmes désordres parmi les pasteurs du peuple ; enfin ils sont aveuglés, et leur puissance est détruite. »
Translation
“A little after these divisions, and in the times of decline, God is purchased for thirty denarii by his ungrateful people; and the prophet sees everything, even down to the field of the potter or sculptor to which that money is applied. Extreme disorders among the shepherds of the people follow from this; at last they are blinded, and their power is destroyed.”
French (continued)
« Le peuple regard celui qu’il a percé. »
Translation (continued)
“The people look upon the one whom they have pierced.”
Note
Bossuet is expounding Zechariah 11:12–13 and 12:10. The phrase Dieu est acheté trente deniers is not merely prophetic — it is an explicit identification of the thirty pieces of silver with the price of God himself, the strongest possible formulation of the deicide charge short of the word itself (which appears in section XI). The brevity of the second quotation — Le peuple regard celui qu’il a percé — gives it rhetorical force: the piercing is done; the looking-upon is the recognition that comes too late.
VIII. “Les Juifs avares offrent des victimes défectueuses” — Malachi: The Defective Sacrifices of the Jews
Source: File 1, lines 9693–9702 (Part II, Ch. X)
French
« Les Juifs avares offrent des victimes défectueuses à Dieu, et profanent son autel ; mais le Seigneur leur déclare qu’il ne veut plus de leurs sacrifices, et que son nom sera grand parmi les nations, depuis le soleil levant jusqu’au soleil couchant, et qu’en tout lieu on lui offrira une oblation pure. »
Translation
“The avaricious Jews offer defective victims to God and profane his altar; but the Lord declares to them that he no longer wants their sacrifices, and that his name shall be great among the nations, from the rising of the sun to its setting, and that in every place a pure oblation shall be offered to him.”
Note
Bossuet is expounding Malachi 1:10–11. The structure of the passage is a direct supersessionist contrast: defective Jewish sacrifice (victimes défectueuses, profanent son autel) versus the pure oblation of the Gentiles offered en tout lieu. The word avares (avaricious) picks up the Malachian charge that the Jews brought lame and sick animals rather than first-quality offerings — a detail Bossuet amplifies into a characterological indictment. The passage serves his broader argument that the Old Covenant cult was already prophetically condemned by its own prophets before Christ arrived to abolish it.
IX. “Une infinité de fables impertinentes” — Description of the Talmud
Source: File 1, lines 12291–12302 (Part II, Ch. XIX)
French
« Ils ont leur livre qu’ils nomment Talmud, c’est-à-dire Doctrine, qu’ils ne respectent pas moins que l’Ecriture elle-même. C’est un ramas des traités et des sentences de leurs anciens maîtres ; et encore que les parties dont ce grand ouvrage est composé ne soient pas toutes de la même antiquité, les derniers auteurs qui y sont cités ont vécu dans les premiers siècles de l’Eglise. Là, parmi une infinité de fables impertinentes, qu’on voit commencer pour la plupart après les temps de Notre-Seigneur, on trouve de beaux restes des anciennes traditions du peuple juif, et des preuves pour le convaincre. »
Translation
“They have their book which they call the Talmud — that is to say, Doctrine — which they respect no less than Scripture itself. It is a collection of treatises and sentences of their ancient masters; and although the parts of which this great work is composed are not all of the same antiquity, the latest authors cited in it lived in the first centuries of the Church. There, amid an infinity of impertinent fables — which began for the most part after the time of Our Lord — one finds fine remnants of the ancient traditions of the Jewish people, and proofs to convict them.”
Note
Bossuet’s characterisation of the Talmud is polemically calculated. He grants it historical value as a witness — it preserves les anciennes traditions du peuple juif — while dismissing its dominant content as fables impertinentes. The chronological observation (most of the fables postdate Christ) is an apologetic move: the fables are implicitly a defensive reaction to Christianity, not an independent tradition. Most importantly, he uses the Talmud’s own content against its custodians: the very book the Jews revere comme l’Ecriture elle-même provides des preuves pour les convaincre — evidence to convict them. This is developed further in section X.
X. “Maudits soient ceux qui comptent les temps du Messie !” — Talmudic Traditions Confirm Christ’s Time Had Come
Source: File 1, lines 13274–13282; 13620–13634; 13843–13877 (Part II, Ch. XXII)
French
« Les rabbins avouent eux-mêmes que le temps du Messie est arrivé selon leurs calculs ; mais que leurs péchés ont retardé sa venue. Ainsi ils souhaitent son avènement, et se plaignent de ce qu’il tarde, sans songer à lui rendre justice. Cette attente confuse et troublée leur fait décréter : Maudits soient ceux qui comptent les temps du Messie ! »
Translation
“The rabbis themselves admit that the time of the Messiah has arrived according to their calculations; but that their sins have delayed his coming. Thus they desire his advent and complain of his delay, without thinking to do him justice. This confused and troubled expectation leads them to decree: Cursed be those who reckon the times of the Messiah!”
French (continued)
« Pour éluder les prophéties qui marquent si précisément le temps du Messie, ils ont imaginé deux Messies : l’un fils de Joseph, qui devait venir souffrir et mourir pour le peuple ; l’autre fils de David, qui devait triompher. »
Translation (continued)
“In order to evade the prophecies that mark the time of the Messiah so precisely, they invented two Messiahs: one the son of Joseph, who was to come, suffer, and die for the people; the other the son of David, who was to triumph.”
French (continued)
« Ainsi les Juifs, convaincus par leurs propres traditions de la venue du Messie dans le temps de Jésus-Christ, et ne pouvant ni nier les prophéties ni les accomplir d’une autre manière, avouent leur embarras, se contredisent, et leur incrédulité n’a plus d’excuse. »
Translation (continued)
“Thus the Jews, convicted by their own traditions of the Messiah’s coming in the time of Jesus Christ, and unable either to deny the prophecies or to fulfil them in any other way, confess their embarrassment, contradict themselves, and their unbelief has no more excuse.”
Note
This section is Bossuet at his most forensically precise. The argument uses the Talmud as a weapon against its own authorities: the rabbis’ own calculations confirm the Messiah’s time had come, they themselves acknowledge the delay is due to sin, and their solution — banning the computation of Messianic chronology and inventing a second Messiah — is presented as self-convicting evasion. The phrase leur incrédulité n’a plus d’excuse is the logical conclusion of the entire apologetic: Jewish unbelief is not a matter of insufficient evidence but of wilful refusal in the face of their own testimony.
XI. “Le déicide” — The Deicide Named Explicitly
Source: File 1, lines 12596–12605 (Part II, Ch. XX)
French
« Il fallait que le peuple juif fût frappé d’un châtiment proportionné au plus grand de tous les crimes ; d’un crime sans exemple jusqu’alors, c’est-à-dire au déicide, qui donna aussi lieu à une vengeance dont le monde n’avait encore vu aucun exemple. »
Translation
“It was necessary that the Jewish people be struck with a punishment proportionate to the greatest of all crimes; a crime unheard-of until then, that is to say, the deicide, which also gave rise to a vengeance of which the world had seen no previous example.”
Note
This is Bossuet’s single most direct use of the word déicide. The logical structure is Augustinian: the punishment must be commensurate with the crime; the crime was without precedent in human history; therefore the punishment must also be without precedent. The fall of Jerusalem, the dispersion, and the sixteen centuries of captivity are thus presented not as historical accidents or Roman imperial policy, but as a proportional — indeed, just — divine response to an ontologically unique crime. The word itself (déicide) is not hedged or qualified: it is the theological name Bossuet assigns to what the Jewish people did.
XII. “Son sang soit sur nous et sur nos enfants” — Bloodguilt and Christ’s Prophecy Against Jerusalem
Source: File 1, lines 12611–12660 (Part II, Ch. XX)
French
« « Son sang soit sur nous et sur nos enfants 1. » Jésus-Christ avait prédit que Jérusalem, et tous ceux qui l’avaient rejetée, éprouveraient les effets de cette terrible imprécation. »
Translation
“‘His blood be upon us and upon our children.’ Jesus Christ had predicted that Jerusalem, and all those who had rejected him, would experience the effects of this terrible imprecation.”
French (continued)
« Voilà l’histoire des Juifs. Ils ont persécuté leur Messie […] Ils doivent périr. »
Translation (continued)
“This is the history of the Jews. They persecuted their Messiah […] They must perish.”
Note
The phrase Son sang soit sur nous et sur nos enfants (Matthew 27:25) is reproduced as the hinge between Jewish action and Jewish punishment. Bossuet treats the crowd’s cry not as a rhetorical outcry in extremis but as a formal self-imprecation — a terrible imprécation — that has the force of a juridical declaration binding on all subsequent generations. The summary sentence — Ils doivent périr — renders this as theological necessity: not that the Jews happened to perish, but that they must perish, the outcome being determined by the crime and the bloodguilt they voluntarily assumed.
XIII. “Seize siècles ont vu durer leur captivité” — Sixteen Centuries of Captivity
Source: File 1, lines 13913–13964 (Part II, Ch. XXIII)
French
« Que dirons-nous à un Juif incrédule qui refuse toujours de reconnaître son Messie ? Nous lui dirons avec saint Jérôme : « O Juif incrédule ! la captivité de Babylone a duré soixante-dix ans : quand finira la tienne ? » Mais aujourd’hui ce n’est plus quatre siècles qu’il faut lui opposer ; seize siècles ont vu durer leur captivité. »
Translation
“What shall we say to an unbelieving Jew who still refuses to acknowledge his Messiah? We shall say to him with Saint Jerome: ‘O unbelieving Jew! The captivity of Babylon lasted seventy years: when will yours end?’ But today it is no longer four centuries that must be set against him; sixteen centuries have seen their captivity endure.”
Note
Bossuet here updates Saint Jerome’s fourth-century adversus Judaeos taunt, recalibrating it for his own seventeenth-century moment. The rhetorical structure is characteristic: the precedent of Babylon (seventy years of captivity, then restoration) is contrasted with a Jewish captivity that has no end in sight. Jerome said four centuries; Bossuet corrects: sixteen. The ever-lengthening duration is presented as cumulative proof — not merely punishment but demonstration, the disproportion between Babylonian exile and the present captivity being itself an argument for its divine rather than historical cause.
XIV. “Leur incrédulité n’a plus d’excuse” — Jewish Incredulity Has No Excuse
Source: File 1, lines 13898–13912 (Part II, Ch. XXIII)
French
« Ainsi les Juifs sont convaincus par leur propre aveu ; et la même tradition qui les oblige à croire que le Messie devait venir dans les temps de Jésus-Christ, les oblige encore plus à croire que ce Jésus-Christ, qui a paru en ce temps-là avec tous les caractères marqués par leurs prophètes, est le vrai Messie. Leur incrédulité n’a plus d’excuse. »
Translation
“Thus the Jews are convicted by their own admission; and the same tradition that obliges them to believe that the Messiah was to come in the time of Jesus Christ obliges them all the more to believe that this Jesus Christ, who appeared at that time with all the characteristics marked by their prophets, is the true Messiah. Their unbelief has no more excuse.”
Note
This is the forensic conclusion of Bossuet’s extended engagement with Talmudic chronology. The phrase leur propre aveu (their own admission) is the key: the Jews are not convicted by external Christian argument but by internal Jewish evidence. The Talmud, the rabbis, the chronological traditions — all convict the Jewish people from within. The phrase leur incrédulité n’a plus d’excuse echoes Paul’s use of ἀναπολόγητος (Romans 2:1) and signals that for Bossuet, post-Christian Jewish unbelief is a moral failure, not an intellectual one.
XV. “Condamnés par leurs propres livres” — The Jews as Permanent Living Witnesses
Source: File 1, lines 16640–16651
French
« Nous voyons partout des Juifs, qui, condamnés par leurs propres livres, confirment la vérité de la religion ; ils en portent toute l’histoire écrite sur leur front. »
Translation
“We see Jews everywhere who, condemned by their own books, confirm the truth of religion; they carry its entire history written upon their foreheads.”
Note
A compressed but powerful formulation of the witness people theology. The Jews are simultaneously condemned and useful: condamnés par leurs propres livres yet through that very condemnation confirment la vérité de la religion. The image of history written on the Jewish forehead recalls the mark of Cain — which Augustine had already deployed as a typological parallel — and conflates physical visibility (the dispersed Jews visibly present partout) with textual testimony (their scriptures, their faces, their condition). The Jews are a walking apologetic.
XVI. “Qui ne tremblerait… en voyant la vengeance éclatée sur les Juifs ?” — Saint Paul on Jewish Blindness
Source: File 1, lines 11877–11913
French
« Saint Paul nous fait admirer la profondeur des jugements de Dieu dans la vocation des Gentils et dans l’aveuglement des Juifs. […] « Une partie des Juifs est tombée dans l’aveuglement jusqu’à ce que la plénitude des Gentils entre. » […] Qui ne tremblerait, en lisant ces admirables paroles de saint Paul ; et surtout en voyant la vengeance qui a éclaté si terriblement sur les Juifs depuis tant de siècles ? »
Translation
“Saint Paul makes us marvel at the depth of God’s judgments in the calling of the Gentiles and in the blindness of the Jews. […] ‘A part of the Jews has fallen into blindness until the fullness of the Gentiles enters.’ […] Who would not tremble, reading these admirable words of Saint Paul; and above all seeing the vengeance that has burst out so terribly upon the Jews for so many centuries?”
Note
Bossuet mediates Paul’s Romans 11 through the lens of his own historical moment: the aveuglement des Juifs is not merely a Pauline theological category but an observable historical fact confirmed by sixteen centuries of Jewish suffering. The rhetorical question — Qui ne tremblerait — is directed at the Christian reader, not the Jewish one. Its function is to convert Jewish misery into Christian piety: the sight of Jewish punishment should inspire fear of God in those who witness it, lest they fall into the same trap. The passage structurally links Paul’s theology to Bossuet’s providential historiography.
XVII. “Ils ont exterminé ce peuple ingrat” — The Romans as Instruments of Divine Vengeance
Source: File 3, lines 99–113; 225–229
French
« Les Juifs ont duré jusqu’à Jésus-Christ, sous la puissance des mêmes Romains. Quand ils l’ont méconnu et crucifié, ces mêmes Romains ont prêté leurs mains, sans y penser, à la vengeance divine, et ont exterminé ce peuple ingrat. »
Translation
“The Jews lasted until Jesus Christ under the power of those same Romans. When they failed to recognise him and crucified him, those same Romans lent their hands, without realising it, to divine vengeance, and exterminated that ungrateful people.”
Note
The phrase sans y penser (without realising it) is theologically essential: the Romans are not morally responsible agents in the destruction of Jerusalem but unconscious instruments of Providence. This moves the destruction firmly into the register of divine causation: Titus does not destroy the Jews because of revolt, but because God directs his hand. The word ingrat appears again as the standard characterisation — Jewish ingratitude (toward God, toward Christ) being the formal theological cause of the punishment.
XVIII. “Il chassa les Juifs de ses États” — The Expulsion of the Jews, Noted Without Censure
Source: File 3, lines 8111–8114; 9786–9790; 9966–9967 (Continuation jusqu’à l’an 1700)
French
« Philippe Auguste chassa les Juifs de France, et confisqua leurs biens. »
Translation
“Philip Augustus drove the Jews from France and confiscated their goods.”
French (continued)
« Ferdinand établit l’Inquisition contre les Juifs et les Maures convertis, soupçonnés de retomber dans leurs erreurs ; et il chassa tous les Juifs non convertis qui étoient en si grand nombre dans ses États. »
Translation (continued)
“Ferdinand established the Inquisition against converted Jews and Moors, suspected of falling back into their errors; and he expelled all unconverted Jews who were in such great numbers in his states.”
French (continued)
« Il chassa aussi les Juifs de ses États ; et on remarque qu’il en sortit cent soixante et dix mille familles. »
Translation (continued)
“He also expelled the Jews from his states; and it is noted that 170,000 families departed.”
Note
These entries from the Continuation are notable for their tone: they are recorded in the same neutral, chronicle register as any other administrative act. Philip Augustus’s confiscation, Ferdinand’s Inquisition, the expulsion of 170,000 Jewish families from Spain — none of these receives moral comment, negative or otherwise. The absence of condemnation is itself a form of approval by silence, consistent with Bossuet’s overall framework in which Jewish suffering and dispossession at Christian hands belong to the providential narrative of divine punishment.
XIX. “Justement abandonnés de Dieu” — Jewish Blindness Despite Prophecy
Source: File 1, lines 9519–9533; 9629–9632 (Part II, Ch. IX)
French
« La ruine totale des Juifs, qui a suivi de si près la mort de Notre-Seigneur, fait entendre aux moins clairvoyants l’accomplissement de la prophétie. […] Dieu a révélé ce secret important à Daniel, et il lui déclare que la ruine des Juifs sera la suite de la mort du Christ et de leur méconnaissance. »
Translation
“The total ruin of the Jews, which followed so closely upon the death of Our Lord, makes the fulfilment of the prophecy evident even to the least clear-sighted. […] God revealed this important secret to Daniel, and declares to him that the ruin of the Jews will be the consequence of the death of Christ and of their failure to acknowledge him.”
French (continued)
« Voilà quel devait être à la fin le sort des Juifs, justement abandonnés de Dieu ; et voilà en termes précis le commencement de la décadence à la chute de ces trois princes. »
Translation (continued)
“Such was to be at last the fate of the Jews, justly abandoned by God; and here in precise terms is the beginning of the decline leading to the fall of these three princes.”
Note
The phrase justement abandonnés de Dieu (justly abandoned by God) is Bossuet’s standard characterisation of the Jewish theological condition after the crucifixion: abandonment is not merely historical but juridical — justement. The appeal to Daniel is part of his wider argument that the ruin of the Jews was prophetically determined and therefore constitutes a proof of Christianity, since only foreknowledge could have predicted both the specific time of the Messiah’s coming and the specific mechanism (Jewish rejection) of the subsequent punishment.
XX. “O faiblesse de l’esprit humain, et vanité, source inévitable d’aveuglement !” — Jewish Obstinacy Toward Their Own Messiah
Source: File 1, lines 13289–13293; 13420–13422 (Part II, Ch. XXII)
French
« S’ils n’avaient eu l’esprit occupé des grandeurs mondaines qu’ils voulaient trouver dans le Messie, afin d’y avoir part sous son empire, ils n’auraient pu méconnaître Jésus-Christ. Le fondement qu’ils avaient posé était certain. »
Translation
“If their minds had not been occupied with the worldly greatness they expected to find in the Messiah, so as to share in it under his empire, they could not have failed to recognise Jesus Christ. The foundation they had laid was certain.”
French (continued)
« Mais, ô faiblesse de l’esprit humain, et vanité, source inévitable d’aveuglement ! L’humilité du Sauveur cacha à ces orgueilleux les véritables grandeurs qu’ils devaient chercher dans leur Messie. »
Translation (continued)
“But, O weakness of the human mind, and vanity — the inevitable source of blindness! The humility of the Saviour hid from these proud ones the true greatness they ought to have sought in their Messiah.”
Note
Bossuet here provides a psychological diagnosis of Jewish Messianic error: it was not intellectual inability but moral disposition — vanité, orgueil — that made it impossible for the Jews to recognise Christ. The humility of the Incarnation was a providential stumbling block aimed specifically at the proud. This psychologising of Jewish unbelief is standard in the adversus Judaeos tradition, but Bossuet’s rhetorical exclamation — ô faiblesse de l’esprit humain ! — gives it unusual emotional intensity.
XXI. “Tous les outrages des Juifs, et le crucifie encore une fois” — Sinners Who Renew the Outrages of the Jews (Sermon)
Source: File 4, lines 3950–3956
French
« Qu’arrive-t-il à une âme qui tombe d’un si haut état, qui renouvelle contre Jésus-Christ, et encore contre Jésus-Christ connu et goûté, tous les outrages des Juifs, et le crucifie encore une fois ? Vous reconnoissez le langage de saint Paul. Achevez donc, grand apôtre, et dites-nous ce qu’il faut attendre d’une telle chute si déplorable. « Il est impossible, dit-il, qu’une telle âme soit renouvelée par la pénitence. » »
Translation
“What befalls a soul that falls from so lofty a state, that renews against Jesus Christ — against a Jesus Christ known and savoured — all the outrages of the Jews, and crucifies him once again? You recognise the language of Saint Paul. Then complete it, great apostle, and tell us what is to be expected of so deplorable a fall. ‘It is impossible,’ he says, ‘that such a soul be renewed by penitence.'”
Note
This sermon passage deploys the Jews not as a historical subject but as a theological type: les outrages des Juifs becomes the standard of the worst possible spiritual offence, against which the lapsed Christian sinner is measured. The rhetorical structure — Jewish offence as the nadir that the sinner is said to replicate and even surpass (since he sins against un Jésus-Christ connu et goûté) — is characteristic of adversus Judaeos homiletics, in which Jewish guilt serves as a rhetorical intensifier for Christian moral instruction.
XXII. “Honte au peuple spirituel de flatter les sens par des joies que le peuple charnel ne connaissait pas” — Jewish Simplicity Contrasted with Pagan Theater
Source: File 4, lines 7842–7878 (Maximes et Réflexions sur la Comédie)
French
« Il n’avait pas besoin d’en parler à la maison d’Israël pour laquelle il était venu, où ces plaisirs de tout temps n’avaient point de lieu. Les Juifs n’avaient de spectacles pour se réjouir que leurs fêtes, leurs sacrifices, leurs saintes cérémonies : gens simples et naturels par leur institution primitive, ils n’avaient jamais connu ces inventions de la Grèce […] ce peuple innocent et simple trouve un assez agréable divertissement dans sa famille parmi ses enfants […] c’est un grand exemple pour les chrétiens que celui qu’on voit dans les Juifs ; et c’est une honte au peuple spirituel, de flatter les sens par des joies que le peuple charnel ne connaissait pas. »
Translation
“[Jesus Christ] had no need to speak of it to the house of Israel for which he had come, where such pleasures had never at any time had a place. The Jews had no spectacles to entertain themselves other than their feasts, their sacrifices, their sacred ceremonies: simple and natural people by their primitive institution, they had never known the inventions of Greece […] this innocent and simple people finds a sufficiently pleasant diversion in their family among their children […] it is a great example for Christians, that which one sees in the Jews; and it is a shame for the spiritual people to flatter the senses with joys that the carnal people did not know.”
Note
A formally unusual passage: here the Jews are inverted exempla in the positive direction, their absence of theatrical culture being held up as a rebuke to Christians who attend the theatre. The contrast peuple spirituel / peuple charnel is the standard Pauline-patristic typology (2 Cor. 3), but Bossuet turns it against his Christian contemporaries: the carnal people was at least free of the sensual corruption that the spiritual people now embraces. The implicit argument is a fortiori and slightly paradoxical — the Jews serve as a moral model precisely in their carnal simplicity, and even this backhanded compliment depends on the standard supersessionist framework.
XXIII. “Le nouveau peuple… s’étend et se dilate sans interruption” — The New People of God Overrides the Old
Source: File 1, lines 11801–11813
French
« Ainsi cette dernière et épouvantable désolation des Juifs n’est plus une transmigration, comme celle de Babylone ; ce n’est pas une suspension du gouvernement et de l’état du peuple de Dieu, ni du service solennel de la religion : le nouveau peuple, déjà formé et continué avec l’ancien en Jésus-Christ, n’est pas transporté ; il s’étend et se dilate sans interruption, depuis Jérusalem, où il devait naître, jusqu’aux extrémités de la terre. Les Gentils agrégés aux Juifs deviennent dorénavant les vrais Juifs, le vrai royaume de Juda opposé à cet Israël schismatique et retranché du peuple de Dieu, le vrai royaume de David, par l’obéissance qu’ils rendent aux lois et à l’Evangile de Jésus-Christ, fils de David. »
Translation
“Thus this last and terrible desolation of the Jews is no longer a transmigration, as that of Babylon was; it is not a suspension of the government and the state of the people of God, nor of the solemn service of religion: the new people, already formed and continued with the ancient in Jesus Christ, is not transported; it extends and expands without interruption, from Jerusalem, where it was to be born, to the ends of the earth. The Gentiles aggregated to the Jews henceforth become the true Jews, the true kingdom of Judah opposed to that schismatic Israel cut off from the people of God, the true kingdom of David, through their obedience to the laws and the Gospel of Jesus Christ, son of David.”
Note
This is Bossuet’s formal supersessionist conclusion. The contrast with the Babylonian exile is structurally crucial: Babylon was a transmigration with restoration built in; the present dispersion is final, not temporary. The Church does not wait for Jewish restoration — it is the restoration, the expansion of the new people absorbing and superseding the old. The phrase Israël schismatique definitively forecloses any theological legitimacy for post-Christian Judaism: the Jews are not the original from which Christians split, but the schism from the true continuity that runs through Christ.
XXIV. “O temple ! ô temple ! qu’est-ce qui t’émeut ?” — Talmudic Portents Before the Fall of Jerusalem
Source: File 1, lines 12304–12390 (Part II, Ch. XIX)
French
« Il est certain, de l’aveu des Juifs, que la vengeance divine ne s’est jamais plus terriblement ni plus manifestement déclarée qu’elle fit dans leur dernière désolation. C’est une tradition constante, attestée dans leur Talmud, et confirmée par tous leurs rabbins, que, quarante ans avant la ruine de Jérusalem, ce qui revient à peu près au temps de la mort de Jésus-Christ, on ne cessait de voir dans le temple des choses étranges. Tous les jours il y paraissait de nouveaux prodiges, de sorte qu’un fameux rabbin s’écria un jour : « O temple ! ô temple ! qu’est-ce qui t’émeut, et pourquoi te fais-tu peur à toi-même ? » »
Translation
“It is certain, by the admission of the Jews themselves, that divine vengeance was never more terribly or more manifestly declared than it was in their last desolation. It is a constant tradition, attested in their Talmud and confirmed by all their rabbis, that forty years before the ruin of Jerusalem — which corresponds roughly to the time of the death of Jesus Christ — strange things were continually seen in the Temple. Every day new prodigies appeared, so that a famous rabbi one day cried out: ‘O Temple! O Temple! what is it that moves you, and why do you frighten yourself?'”
French (continued)
« Qu’y a-t-il de plus marqué que ce bruit affreux qui fut ouï par les prêtres dans le sanctuaire le jour de la Pentecôte, et cette voix manifeste qui sortit du fond de ce lieu sacré : « Sortons d’ici ! sortons d’ici ! » Les saints anges protecteurs du temple déclarèrent hautement qu’ils l’abandonnaient, parce que Dieu, qui y avait établi sa demeure durant tant de siècles, l’avait réprouvé. »
Translation (continued)
“What could be more unmistakable than the dreadful noise heard by the priests in the sanctuary on the day of Pentecost, and that manifest voice which came out of the depths of that sacred place: ‘Let us depart! let us depart!’ The holy angels who protected the Temple declared openly that they were abandoning it, because God, who had established his dwelling there for so many centuries, had reprobated it.”
French (continued)
« Quatre ans devant la guerre déclarée, un paysan, dit Josèphe, se mit à crier : Une voix est sortie du côté de l’orient, une voix est sortie du côté de l’occident, une voix est sortie du côté des quatre vents : voix contre Jérusalem et contre le temple ; voix contre les nouveaux mariés et les nouvelles mariées ; voix contre tout le peuple. […] Il continua durant sept ans à crier de cette sorte, sans se relâcher, et sans que sa voix s’affaiblît. […] Ce prophète des malheurs de Jérusalem s’appelait Jésus. Il semblait que le nom de Jésus, nom de salut et de paix, devait tourner aux Juifs, qui le méprisaient en la personne de notre Sauveur, à un funeste présage ; et que ces ingrats ayant rejeté un Jésus qui leur annonçait la grâce, la miséricorde et la vie, Dieu leur envoyait un autre Jésus qui n’avait à leur annoncer que des maux irrémédiables, et l’inévitable décret de leur ruine prochaine. »
Translation (continued)
“‘Four years before the declared war, a peasant,’ says Josephus, ‘began to cry out: A voice from the east, a voice from the west, a voice from the four winds: a voice against Jerusalem and against the Temple; a voice against the bridegrooms and brides; a voice against all the people.’ […] He continued for seven years to cry in this manner, without relenting, and without his voice ever weakening. […] This prophet of the woes of Jerusalem was named Jesus. It seemed that the name of Jesus — a name of salvation and peace — was destined to become for the Jews, who despised it in the person of our Saviour, a fatal omen; and that these ungrateful people, having rejected a Jesus who announced grace, mercy, and life, God sent them another Jesus who had nothing to announce but irremediable evils and the inevitable decree of their imminent ruin.”
Note
Bossuet draws on Josephus (Bellum Judaicum, VI.5) and Talmudic tradition (tractate Yoma) for these portents, using Jewish and pagan sources simultaneously — again the strategy of convicting the Jews de leur propre aveu. The detail that the anonymous prophet of doom was named Jesus is given full theological weight: it is a providential sign, a divine irony designed specifically for the Jews. Having rejected the true Jesus, they receive a namesake who can only curse them. The forty-year interval (death of Christ to fall of Jerusalem) is a recurring chronological proof in Bossuet, linking the two events as cause and effect within a precisely measured divine timetable.
XXV. “Elle nous livre à notre sens réprouvé” — The Two Destructions of Jerusalem as Expressions of the Same Divine Justice
Source: File 1, lines 12392–12409
French
« Pénétrons plus avant dans les jugements de Dieu, sous la conduite de ses Écritures. Jérusalem et son temple ont été deux fois détruits ; l’une par Nabuchodonosor, l’autre par Tite. Mais, en chacun de ces deux temps, la justice de Dieu s’est déclarée par les mêmes voies, quoique plus à découvert dans le dernier. […] Posons, avant toutes choses, cette vérité si souvent établie dans les saintes Lettres : que l’un des plus terribles effets de la vengeance divine est lorsqu’en punition de nos péchés précédents, elle nous livre à notre sens réprouvé, en sorte que nous sommes sourds à tous les sages avertissements, aveugles aux voies de salut qui nous sont montrées, prompts à croire tout ce qui nous perd pourvu qu’il nous flatte, et hardis à tout entreprendre, sans jamais mesurer nos forces avec celles des ennemis que nous irritons. »
Translation
“Let us penetrate further into the judgments of God, guided by his Scriptures. Jerusalem and its Temple were destroyed twice: once by Nebuchadnezzar, and once by Titus. But in each of these two times, the justice of God was declared by the same means, though more openly in the latter. […] Let us establish, before all else, this truth so often affirmed in the holy Scriptures: that one of the most terrible effects of divine vengeance is when, in punishment for our previous sins, it delivers us to our reprobate mind, so that we are deaf to all wise warnings, blind to the paths of salvation shown to us, quick to believe whatever leads us to ruin as long as it flatters us, and bold to undertake everything without ever measuring our strength against that of the enemies we provoke.”
Note
Bossuet frames the two destructions of Jerusalem as a structural rhyme in providential history. The principle articulated — that God’s most terrible punishment is to deliver the sinner to le sens réprouvé, that is, to a reprobate or abandoned mind — is drawn from Romans 1:28. Applied to the Jews, it means that their very incapacity to see reason or read the signs around them is itself the punishment: they are not merely blind but divinely blinded. The second destruction (by Titus) being plus à découvert — more openly legible — means that the fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD is transparently intelligible as theological judgment in a way that Nebuchadnezzar’s conquest was only typologically.
XXVI. “Le peuple Juif ingrat envers son auteur” — Nebuchadnezzar as Instrument of Punishment
Source: File 3, lines 225–229
French
« Vous avez vu les endroits où Nabuchodonosor a été marqué comme celui qui devoit venir pour punir les peuples superbes, et sur-tout le peuple Juif ingrat envers son auteur. »
Translation
“You have seen the passages where Nebuchadnezzar is marked out as the one who was to come to punish proud peoples, and above all the Jewish people, ungrateful toward its Creator.”
Note
A brief but structurally significant passage from the Continuation. Ingrat envers son auteur — ungrateful toward its Creator — is Bossuet’s most compressed formulation of the Jewish theological crime, reduced to a single phrase. The word auteur (author, creator) is chosen over Dieu or Seigneur: gratitude is owed to God precisely as the one who brought the people into existence and sustained it. Nebuchadnezzar’s function as divine instrument here anticipates the same role later played by Titus (section XVII): in both cases, pagan military power is conscripted into the service of divine justice against le peuple Juif ingrat.
Primary Sources
All passages in this compilation are drawn from the following digitised editions, available in full on the Internet Archive:
File 1 — Main edition used throughout (Parts I–III of the Discours, all chapter references) Bossuet, Jacques-Bénigne. Discours sur l’Histoire Universelle. Paris: Garnier-Flammarion, 1966. Scanned from the Garnier-Flammarion critical edition. https://archive.org/details/discourssurlhist00boss/page/260/mode/2up
File 2 — Lyon 1813 edition, Tome Premier Bossuet, Jacques-Bénigne. Discours sur l’Histoire Universelle à Monseigneur le Dauphin : pour expliquer la suite de la religion et les changemens des empires. Tome Premier. Lyon, 1813. https://archive.org/details/discourssurlhist01bossuoft/page/6/mode/2up
File 3 — Lyon 1813 edition, Tome Second (includes Continuation jusqu’à l’an 1700) Bossuet, Jacques-Bénigne. Discours sur l’Histoire Universelle à Monseigneur le Dauphin : pour expliquer la suite de la religion et les changemens des empires. Tome Second. Lyon, 1813. Bound with Continuation de l’Histoire Universelle jusqu’à l’an 1700. https://archive.org/details/discourssurlhist02bossuoft/page/n7/mode/2up
File 4 — Sermons, Oraisons funèbres, and Maximes sur la Comédie Bossuet, Jacques-Bénigne. Oraisons funèbres, Sermons, Maximes et Réflexions sur la Comédie. Paris: La Renaissance du Livre. https://archive.org/details/oraisonsfunebres00boss/page/n1/mode/2up