Johannes Reuchlin and the Campaign to Destroy Jewish BooksThe early sixteenth century saw a major crisis in Christian Jewish relations: the attempt to confiscate and destroy every Jewish book in Germany. This unprecedented effort to end the practice of Judaism throughout the empire was challenged by Jewish communities, and, unexpectedly, by Johannes Reuchlin (1455 1522), the founder of Christian Hebrew studies. In 1510, Reuchlin wrote an extensive, impassioned, and ultimately successful defense of Jewish