Baring-Gould’s sources: Gallican Martyrologies. Authority: — A life founded partly on written accounts, partly on oral tradition, and when it was compiled is uncertain.] be their panegyrist, but if he relates their lives as they really were, taking Holy Scripture as his model, it is his [May i.
…duty not to gloss over their failings, and omit all mention of their faults. Holy Scripture mentions the fall of David, the apostasy of Solomon, the denial of S. Peter, and the hagiographer is dealing falsely with his materials if he does not relate what is blameworthy as well as what is to the praise of tire saint whose life he is recording. S. Theodard is chiefly known through an event in his life which first brought him into notice, and which we cannot fail to regard with the strongest reprobation. At his time at Toulouse it was the custom on Christmas Day, on Good Friday, and on the Feast of the Assumption, for a Jew to have his cheeks rudely boxed publicly before the cathedral doors, as part of the religious ceremonial. The Jews complained to the king, Carloman, son of Louis the Stammerer (d. 879), who reigned with his brother Louis III. The king bade the count of Toulouse call a council at Toulouse and investigate the case. Sigebod was then bishop, and the Jews made their complaint against him and the clergy of the cathedral. One would have supposed that the bishop would have been only too glad to have abandoned a custom as insulting as it was unchristian, but instead of doing so he resisted strenuously, and appointed the youthful Theodard, who offered to argue the case, to be his advocate. Theodard then produced a document, which was unquestionably a forgery, and which purported to be a charter of Charlemagne [king of the Franks, crowned emperor in 800] requiring the perpetuation of the offensive ceremony, because the Jews of Toulouse had invited into the country the forces of Abdelraman, which he had just succeeded in defeating. As it happened, it was not Charlemagne but Charles Martel who defeated the Saracens [medieval Christian name for Arab and Muslim peoples] and drove them out of the South of France; but this may be an error of the writer of the life, and not of Theodard the advocate. Suffice it to say that the Jews were utterly confounded by the products tion of this charter, as well as they might be; and Theodard, pursuing the advantage thus unscrupulously gained, obtained that on each of the three festivals, the Jew exposed to the stroke at the cathedral gate should be required to exclaim, “This I receive because my people crucified Jesus Christ, God of Gods, and Lord of Lords.” And should he refuse, he was to receive seven blows instead of one. Theodard condescended to argue with the unfortunate Jews; but, as Henschenius justly observes, “his arguments are more deserving of the name of quibbles.” The archbishop of Narbonne was so satisfied with the conduct of Theodard in this scandalous affair, that he ordained him and made him his archdeacon. On the death of the archbishop, Theodard was elected to fill his room, and he was consecrated amidst general rejoicings, even those of the Jews, we are told, which the Jew Apella may believe if he lists.
As archbishop he behaved with justice and was a model of piety. His seat was contested by a rival prelate, but Theodard obtained papal sanction and excommunicated his adversary.
