Western Christianity in the 13th century was developing its intellectual acumen and had assimilated the challenges of Aristotle through the works of Thomas Aquinas.

He also selected what he said were injunctions of Talmudic sages permitting Jews to kill non-Jews, to deceive Christians, and to break promises made to them without scruples.

[citation needed] Twentieth-century Jewish scholar Hyam Maccoby alleges that the purpose of the Paris disputation was to rid the Jews of their "belief in the Talmud", in order that they might return to Old Testament Abrahamism and eventually embrace Christianity.

[15] The Disputation set in place a train of events which culminated in a burning of a great number of Jewish holy texts, on 17 June 1242.

[16] "One estimate is that the 24 wagonloads included up to 10,000 volumes of Hebrew manuscripts, a startling number when one considers that the printing press did not yet exist, so that all copies of a work had to be written out by hand.

[17] Louis IX stated that only skilled clerics could conduct a disputation with Jews, but that laymen should plunge a sword into those who speak ill of the Christ.

[18][19] A prominent religious-Zionist rabbi, Shlomo Aviner, suggested that the Notre-Dame fire may have been divine retribution for the burning of the Talmud in 1242.