WANDERING JEW. - A popular myth, which under the name "Ahasuerus" personifies the eternal wanderer, who after the drama of Calvary has neither homeland nor rest. It appears in literature at the beginning of the 17th century, as the hero of a novel written in German.
In this tale the bishop of Schleswig, Paul of Etzen, reports having seen in 1547 in Hamburg in a church a tall man, with long hair, who uttered groans whenever the name of Jesus was pronounced, at the same time beating his breast; in the depths of winter, he was barefoot and poorly clothed. He said he was a Jew native to Jerusalem, that his name was Ahasverus, and that he practiced the trade of shoemaker; he would have joined in the cry of Crucify, asking for the release of Barabbas. As he was making his way to the execution, Jesus would have leaned against the wall of his house to rest, and he would have driven him away. Jesus would have said to him: "I want to stop and rest, but you will have to walk until the day of judgment." Ahasuerus would have witnessed the Crucifixion. From that time on he was always on the move. After a hundred years, he had returned to Jerusalem, and had found the city destroyed.
Sometimes he bears the name of "Cartophilus." In the Histoire admirable du juif errant, Ahasuerus is said to be a descendant of the tribes of Naphtali, born in the year 3992 after the creation of the world; it is also said that his mother would have sewn the garments for the Levites.
The figure of the W. J. also recurs often in art; cf. La légende du juif errant by G. Doré. In literature the subject was taken up by Goethe, Schubart, A. W. Schlegel, Brentano, Camoens, Gutzkow, Lenau, Hamerling, Carmen Sylva; among the French: Complainte, Béranger, E. Quinet, E. Sue, Dumas père; among the English: Byron, Shelley.
Bibliography2 works
Eugenio Zolli