The Renaissance, which produced the Reformation, also had a favorable effect on the position of the Jews. When John Pfefferkorn, a convert from Judaism, in 1506 accused the Jews of blaspheming Jesus in their prayers and in their literature, and proposed the confiscation of all their books, John Reuchlin, a famous diplomat and expert Hebrew scholar, rendered an opinion in their favor. The Dominicans of Cologne, among them a former rabbi, Victor von Karben, whose tool Pfefferkorn had been, made the latter’s cause their own, but did not succeed. In Frankfort-on-the-Main, where the books had been confiscated, they were ordered to be returned to their owners, and a long and bitter controversy, in which both parties engaged in vile attacks, ensued. In the meantime the Reformation intervened; and the Pope, who had been appealed to, ended the matter by an order in 1516 that both parties should keep their peace. He reversed this decision in favor of the Dominicans in 1520. Such occasions as the calumniations of Pfefferkorn and others showed the arbitrariness of municipalities and lords in the treatment of the Jews, and pointed out the advisability of Jews appointing an advocate, “Shtadlan,” who would always defend their rights when necessary. One of the most famous of these was Josel Rosheim (1478-1554) who was originally appointed as their advocate by the Jews of Alsace, and often acted in behalf of all the Jews of Germany, here and there arbitrating dissensions in congregations. He obtained various charters from Emperor Charles V, in which protection to the Jews was promised. Among these stipulations, one issued in 1530 is of special interest. The Emperor prohibited the expulsion of Jews from his territory without his consent. This rule, however, was not even observed in the immediate possessions of the German rulers. At various times Ferdinand I, brother of Charles V, and German Emperor (1522-1564) ordered expulsions from Austria in 1557, and in 1541 and 1561 from Bohemia; they were hardly ever carried out. When the expulsion from Bohemia was decreed, Mordecai Meisels, a wealthy Jew of Prague, 1528-1601, and the descendant of the Italian family Soncino, which in 1513 established a printing press in Prague, went to Rome and obtained a bull from the Pope for the protection of the Jews. The law of expulsion from Bohemia was repealed. Meisels was in other ways a great benefactor of his co-religionists.