Exploring Multiconfessionality from the Inside: Jews and Christians between Polemics and Exchange in the Sixteenth-Century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was characterized by extraordinary cultural and religious diversity and became a haven for the persecuted. Catholics, Armenians, Muslims, Orthodox, Hussites, various Protestant and non-Catholic movements, and Jews—both Rabbanite and Karaite—coexisted within its borders. The Karaite community leader Isaac ben Abraham Troki (ca. 1533–1594) authored the celebrated anti-Christian polemical work Sefer Ḥizzuq Emunah (Strengthening of Faith), completed around 1594 in the town of Troki. Likely during the reign of Stephen Báthory, Isaac had the opportunity to read, study, and draw upon Christian writings, including Antitrinitarian sources such as the works of his contemporaries Nicholas Paruta, Marcin Czechowic, and Simon Budny. He also engaged in personal encounters with prominent representatives of both Catholic and Protestant Christianity. Beyond documenting the themes debated between Jews and Christians, the Ḥizzuq Emunah offers valuable insight into the dynamics of religious diversity and the distinctive features of the confessional landscape in which it was composed. This article investigates the patterns of contact, conflict, and mutual influence among the different religious groups of the Commonwealth as reflected in Troki's work, with the aim of recovering a significant emic perspective on early modern interreligious relations.