The period since the close of World War II has been agonizingly introspective-not least because of the pain of reassessing Christianity's attitude to Judaism. The early Christian materials have often been examined to assess their role in the long-standing negative attitude of Christians to Jews. The motivation for the early church's sometimes harsh attitude was partly theological-it needed to define itself over against its parent-and partly sociological-it needed to make clear the line that divided the fledgling group of Christian believers fromt he group with which it was most likely to b