IVO OF CHARTRES°

IVO OF CHARTRES° (c. 1040–1115), bishop of Chartres from 1091 until his death. He was proclaimed the patron of barristers because of his contribution to canon law, in particular the Decretum which he drew up in 1094. In it Ivo voices the change in the Christian attitude toward the Jews which occurred during the 11th century. The 13th book of the Decretum contains a series of texts in which the Jews are proclaimed unfit to testify in court, to fill any public office, and forbidden to appear in public during Easter or to supply medicaments to Christians. Among the prescriptions is one of major importance for the social standing of Jews vis-à-vis gentiles: that which declares them unqualified for military service. This had already appeared in Roman law (Theodosian Code, Novella 3), but Ivo preferred to attribute it to the Church Father jerome , to give the maximum theological weight to the social ostracizing of the Jews. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: B. Blumenkranz, Juifs et chrétiens… (1960), index; R. Sprandel, Ivo von Chartres und seine Stellung in der Kirchengeschichte (1962). (Bernhard Blumenkranz)