Anthonius Margaritha (b. c. 1490), apostate and anti-Jewish writer. Although the son of a rabbi, Samuel son of Jacob Margolioth of Regensburg, while he was still a Jew he denounced the Regensburg community to the authorities. He converted to Catholicism in 1522, and later became a Protestant. He was a lecturer in Hebrew at Augsburg, Meissen Zell, Leipzig, and from 1537 until his death, at Vienna University. In his first anti-Jewish book, Der Gantz Juedisch Glaub... (first published in Augsburg, 1530), Margarita modeled himself on similar writings by the apostates Johannes Pfefferkorn and Victor von Carben. In an attempt to ridicule the religious precepts of the Jews, their customs, and their habits, he accused them of lacking charity, of reviling Christianity (in the Aleinu prayer), and finally of treason. The large number of Jewish prayers in his own translation included in the book reveal his ignorance of Jewish writings (as noted by Johann Wagenseil in his Latin translation of tractate Sotah (Altdorf, 1674), 1105) and his scanty knowledge of Hebrew. The book formed the basis of a religious disputation between Joseph (Joselmann) b. Gershom of Rosheim and Margarita held at the Diet of Augsburg of 1530 at the instance of Emperor Charles V. When Joseph of Rosheim succeeded in proving that the apostate's allegations were unfounded, Margarita was imprisoned and later banished from Augsburg. However, his book was reprinted many times (Frankfort, 1544, 1561, 1689; Leipzig, 1705, 1713) and was widely read. It particularly influenced Martin Luther, who quoted it many times in his Von den Juden und ihren Luegen. Margarita was also the author of Dar Muschiach Schon Khomen (1534).

Title: Die alteste gedruckte deutsche Uebersetzung des jüdischen Gebetbuches a.d. Jahre 1530 und ihr Autor Anthonius Margaritha