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can properly be called anti-Christian polemics (such as, for instance, Profiat Du- ran’s Kelimat ha-Goyim or the medieval Nizzahon Yashan), it could also be in- cluded in collections of tales (ma’asyiot) or alongside other popular and witty narratives such as Alphabet of Ben Sira or Massekhet Purim.40 In the Netherlands, where Jews enjoyed somewhat more freedom to express their religious senti- ments, Yiddish interpretations of Toledot Yeshu were perhaps even performed within the community. Evi Michels recently pointed to an 18th-century Yiddish manuscript dividing the narrative into a series of “acts” (bedrijf), while another is adorned with a frontispiece showing a stage curtain.41 Sarit Kattan Gribetz similarly wonders whether the story was not indeed read aloud or performed on specific occasions such as Easter or Christmas, as anti-Jewish authors often claimed, to vent communal anxieties and celebrate the demise of the evil Je- sus42 – and perhaps also for the amusement (and edification) of Jewish children. Toledot Yeshu is as playful as it is polemical. There is much to say about the role of humour and irony in the hidden transcript, and while humour is notori- ously difficult to trace historically, many episodes in the extant Toledot tradi- tion unequivocally function as gags.43 Such is the case with the story of Jesus’ conception, which narrates how Mary’s neighbour Pandera was able to pass as her husband (or fiancé) and lie with her (in effect, rape her).44 When Mary’s hus- band returns and in his turn seeks to embrace his wife, she rebukes him, claim- ing they already had sex and leaving the husband perplexed. The scene and its witty dialogue are obviously closer to Boccaccio or the medieval fabliaux, full of wanton erotic jokes, than to solemn religious disputations, and as such were presumably meant to prompt the audience to laugh.45 HUMOUR IN THE HULDREICH VERSION The late medieval Huldreich version, which in many respects departs from the standard tradition, is punctuated by such humorous snippets.46 Here Mary is de- scribed as an exceptionally beautiful woman who is locked up by her husband “lest the villains whore with her”. Passing under her window, Pandera rescues her with a ladder and they run away to live in adultery. When he discovers his spurious origins, their son, Jesus, kills his father and tortures his mother before 40 See Yassif 2011; Horbury 2013. Note however that the evidence mainly comes from Oriental manu- scripts. 41 Michels 2017 and forthcoming. 42 Kattan Gribetz 2011, 176–179, and see above, n. 32 for further references. 43 See the studies gathered in Classen 2010. In particular, see Sewell 2010. 44 Literary parallels are explored in Di Segni 1985; see further Barbu 2018 (b), 94, n80. 45 See however Sewell 2010 on humour in Nizzahon Yashan. 46 On the Huldreich text, see Yoffie 2011. 38 | Daniel Barbu www.jrfm.eu 2019, 5/1