Pope Innocent IV on the Talmud

Pope Innocent IV, 1244: “‘Why is it that you yourselves violate the commandment of God with your traditions?’ [Mt. 15:3]. It is traditions of this stripe – in Hebrew they call them ‘Thalamuth’ [the Talmud], and an immense book it is, exceeding the text of the Bible in size, and in it are blasphemies against God and His Christ, and against the blessed Virgin, fables that are manifestly beyond all explanation, erroneous abuses, and unheard-of stupidities – yet this is what they teach and feed their children… and render them totally alien to the teaching of the Law and the Prophets, fearing lest the Truth, which is understood in the same Law and Prophets, bearing patent testimony to the only-begotten Son of God, who was to come in the flesh, they be converted to the faith, and return humbly to their Redeemer.”