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Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881) was a Christian. His marriage took place in a church. So did his funeral. He had been baptized as a boy of twelve. Had he not been, he would never have been able to pursue the political career that brought him world fame, since, until 1858, new members entering the British House of Commons were required to take their oath “on the true faith of a Christian.” Nor was there much in Disraeli’s political career that reflected his Jewish origins, certainly not in an obvious or explicit fashion. It is true that he consistently supported the admission of Jewish MPs to Parliament, but this was the exception. On other Jewish issues, such as the Damascus blood libel of 1840, which created an international outcry, he remained silent. Robert Blake’s classic modern biography (1968), which concentrates on his politics, runs to over 800 pages. It devotes only a dozen of them to Jewishness and Judaism.

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