The Church and Cloister of Les Billettes form one of the clearest urban examples of medieval anti-Judaism in France. The site is linked to a thirteenth-century accusation against a Jew in Paris and to the transformation of that accusation into Christian devotion, pilgrimage and architecture.

The accusation against Jonathas

In 1290, a Jewish man in Paris named Jonathas was accused of profaning a consecrated host. According to the Christian narrative, he cut the host with a knife, the host bled, and it later survived boiling water. This story became known as the “miracle” of Les Billettes.

The accusation belonged to a wider medieval pattern of host-desecration charges against Jews. In these narratives, Christian devotion to the Eucharist was turned into accusations of Jewish hatred toward Christianity. In the case of Les Billettes, the charge led directly to the death of Jonathas.

Jonathas was condemned to death and burned. The place identified as his house was then transformed into a Christian site of devotion. A first chapel was built there in 1294.

Les Billettes and medieval anti-Judaism

Les Billettes became a lasting monument to the accusation. The site turned the alleged crime of a Jew into a permanent Christian memory inside the city. In this sense, Les Billettes is also a material record of medieval anti-Judaism in Paris.

In 1299, Philippe IV entrusted the chapel to the Frères hospitaliers de la Charité-Notre-Dame, known as the Billettes. The chapel became a place of pilgrimage, supported by the devotional narrative attached to the host and to the supposed house of Jonathas.

The church was rebuilt in 1405, and a cloister was added in 1427. The present church was rebuilt in the eighteenth century. After the French Revolution, the complex was acquired by the City of Paris and later assigned to Lutheran worship.