500 years after the Inquisition,
Spaniards find way back to Judaism
By Jerome Socolovsky



MADRID, March 4 (JTA) — When Nuria Guasch’s grandfather was on his deathbed, he called her over to tell her something he had never told anyone in his 88 years of life.
“I want you to reflect on your heritage — and think for yourself,” Guasch recalls him saying. “And then maybe you’ll have the answer to all those questions you were asking.”

And then he had a final request: Don’t let the hospital’s Roman Catholic priest into the room.

As a child growing up in a village near Barcelona, Guasch had wondered about her family’s unusual habits, like putting bread and salt on the table every Friday night.

Since most everybody else in Spain was Roman Catholic, she just assumed they were bizarre customs from the Spanish island of Mallorca, where her family came from.

But, as her grandfather had predicted, the answers did come later.

It turned out her grandparents were from among the “Chuetas,” or Mallorcans of Jewish origin accused of being Crypto-Jews — or Hidden Jews — for centuries after the expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492.

Many Chuetas married among themselves until the early 20th century because of continued discrimination.

Today, the 49-year-old school principal from Barcelona is ready to reclaim the faith of her forebears.

In a few weeks, she says, she will finalize her conversion to Judaism before a Beit Din, or Jewish court, in Israel.

More than five centuries after the expulsion of Jews by the monarchs of Spain and Portugal, descendants of those who converted to Roman Catholicism to escape the punishment of death increasingly are examining their roots.

During the more than 100 years of pogroms that started in the late 14th century, more than 100,000 Jews are believed to have converted to Christianity.

But many continued practicing Jewish rituals in secret.

In Spanish, the converted Jews were known as Conversos, or “those who converted.”

However, the secret Jews were known as Marranos, or “accursed.”

Although there is some debate about whether the label Marranos should be considered derogatory, some today prefer Anousim, the Hebrew term for “forced converts.”

Their descendants are found not only on the Iberian Peninsula, but also in former Spanish and Portuguese colonies in South and Central America and even in the Southwestern United States.

Brazilian-born Rabbi Jacques Cukierkorn of the New Reform Temple in Kansas City, Mo., recalls that as a child his family had a servant from the rural interior of Brazil.

One Friday night, she saw them kindling Sabbath candles, and she said, “Oh, you light candles too!”

Later, at the Reform movement’s Hebrew Union College, he wrote his thesis on the Crypto-Jewish community in Brazil.

“For every Jew in Brazil, there may be potentially a hundred people who have Jewish blood, who are descendants of Marranos,” said Cukierkorn, who has helped Marrano communities in Brazil get organized.

Cukierkorn also has written a guidebook to Judaism in Spanish and has traveled to Spain to convert several Jews here, partly because he feels that Jewish communities in Spain — dominated by Sephardi Jews who returned from Morocco in the last 50 years — are not open to Marrano descendants.

“Sephardi Jews ought to be more sensitive to Marranos, but I’m not sure they are,” he said.

Reform Jewish leaders are not the only ones reaching out to the Anousim.

The Amishav Institute in Jerusalem was founded in the 1970s by Rabbi Eliyahu Avichail, who embarked on a search for the Ten Lost Tribes and who helped convert the now-famous Crypto-Jews of Belmonte, Portugal.

The organization recently worked with the Bnai Menashe tribe in India — many of whom have since made aliyah — and “Lost Jews” in other parts of the world. Now it is turning its efforts back to the Anousim in Spain.

“We the Jewish people have a moral and historical obligation to these people,” says the director of Amishav, Michael Freund, who was an aide to former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Freund, who visited Mallorca and Iberia in recent months to talk to descendants, estimates that up to 20,000 people in Mallorca alone are identifiable as Chuetas, while hundreds of thousands of people in the Iberian peninsula and South America can be considered descendants of Anousim.

However, Freund urges caution with his own estimates.

“Not all descendants of Anousim are necessarily aware of their heritage,” he says. “And of those that are, not all of them are necessarily interested in returning to Judaism. Some might be happy to remain Catholic while just finding out more about who their ancestors were.”

Freund is quick to add that “we are not a missionary organization. We’re not out there to bring every one of them back.”

Although Amishav’s director prefers to talk about “return” rather than conversion, the organization still advises Anousim to undergo an Orthodox conversion to “remove any doubts” about their Jewishness.

Spaniards in general are becoming increasingly interested in their Jewish history, despite a long tradition of anti-Semitism and official discrimination that lasted through the 1939-1975 church-backed dictatorship of Gen. Francisco Franco.

There has been a surge of interest in Israeli and Jewish culture since the establishment of ties with Israel in 1986.

And an increasing number of Spaniards — though still a very small group – consider themselves Jewish, or partly Jewish by virtue of their Jewish ancestry.

Several years ago, Pere Bonnin, a Barcelona writer of Chueta origin, wrote “Sangre Judia,” or “Jewish Blood,” a book in which he compiled a list of 3,500 surnames of Jewish origin, using documents found in old Jewish neighborhoods and Inquisition archives.

The book’s first printing sold out within 15 days, he says.

But Bonnin says he told an Amishav rabbi that it’s unrealistic to expect mass conversions on the scale of its Indian program, especially in Mallorca.

“You have to change your whole way of life to do this, and it’s already difficult enough” being a Chueta, the writer says.

Nevertheless, he feels “culturally Jewish” and passionately defends the State of Israel against its many detractors in Spain.

In the old Jewish quarter of Cordoba, near a statue of the great Jewish thinker Maimonides, an old man guards the entrance to the freshly restored synagogue.

He says his surname is Peres Peres, which according to Spanish tradition means that both his father and mother were named Peres. But he adds that even his grandmothers were named Peres, “so actually I’m Peres Peres Peres Peres.”

Asked if there are many people in Cordoba who are aware of their Jewish roots, he says: “Half of Cordoba is Jewish!”


http://www.jta.org/story.asp?id=030304-marr

Non-Turkish Crimes Against Humanity

Fourth Lateran Council, 1215
Canons on Jews




CANON 67
Summary. Jews should be compelled to make satisfaction for the tithes and offerings to churches, which the Christians supplied before their properties fell into the hands of the Jews.

Text. The more the Christians are restrained from the practice of usury, the more are they oppressed in this matter by the treachery of the Jews, so that in a short time they exhaust the resources of the Christians. Wishing, therefore, in this matter to protect the Christians against cruel oppression by the Jews, we ordain in this decree that if in the future under any pretext Jews extort from Christians oppressive and immoderate interest, the partnership of the Christians shall be denied them till they have made suitable satisfaction for their excesses. The Christians also, every appeal being set aside, shall, if necessary, be compelled by ecclesiastical censure to abstain from all commercial intercourse with them. We command the princes not to be hostile to the Christians on this account, but rather to strive to hinder the Jews from practicing such excesses. Lastly, we decree that the Jews be compelled by the same punishment (avoidance of commercial intercourse) to make satisfaction for the tithes and offerings due to the churches, which the Christians were accustomed to supply from their houses and other possessions before these properties, under whatever title, fell into the hands of the Jews, that thus the churches may be safeguarded against loss.



CANON 68
Summary. Jews and Saracens of both sexes in every Christian province must be distinguished from the Christian by a difference of dress. On Passion Sunday and the last three days of Holy Week they may not appear in public.

Text: In some provinces a difference in dress distinguishes the Jews or Saracens from the Christians, but in certain others such a confusion has grown up that they cannot be distinguished by any difference. Thus it happens at times that through error Christians have relations with the women of Jews or Saracens, and Jews and Saracens with Christian women. Therefore, that they may not, under pretext of error of this sort, excuse themselves in the future for the excesses of such prohibited intercourse, we decree that such Jews and Saracens of both sexes in every Christian province and at all times shall be marked off in the eyes of the public from other peoples through the character of their dress. Particularly, since it may be read in the writings of Moses [Numbers 15:37-41], that this very law has been enjoined upon them.

Moreover, during the last three days before Easter and especially on Good Friday, they shall not go forth in public at all, for the reason that some of them on these very days, as we hear, do not blush to go forth better dressed and are not afraid to mock the Christians who maintain the memory of the most holy Passion by wearing signs of mourning.

This, however, we forbid most severely, that any one should presume at all to break forth in insult to the Redeemer. And since we ought not to ignore any insult to Him who blotted out our disgraceful deeds, we command that such impudent fellows be checked by the secular princes by imposing them proper punishment so that they shall not at all presume to blaspheme Him who was crucified for us.

[Note by Schroeder: In 581 the Synod of Macon enacted in canon 14 that from Thursday in Holy Week until Easter Sunday. Jews may not in accordance with a decision of King Childebert appear in the streets and in public places. Mansi, IX, 934; Hefele-Leclercq, 111, 204. In 1227 the Synod of Narbonne in canon 3 ruled: "That Jews may be distinguished from others, we decree and emphatically command that in the center of the breast (of their garments) they shall wear an oval badge, the measure of one finger in width and one half a palm in height. We forbid them moreover, to work publicly on Sundays and on festivals. And lest they scandalize Christians or be scandalized by Christians, we wish and ordain that during Holy Week they shall not leave their houses at all except in case of urgent necessity, and the prelates shall during that week especially have them guarded from vexation by the Christians." Mansi, XXIII, 22; Hefele-Leclercq V 1453. Many decrees similar to these in content were issued by synods before and after this Lateran Council. Hefele-Leclercq, V and VI; Grayzel, The Church and the Jews in the XIIIth Century, Philadelphia, 1933.]



CANON 69
Summary. Jews are not to be given public offices. Anyone instrumental in doing this is to be punished. A Jewish official is to be denied all intercourse with Christians.

Text. Since it is absurd that a blasphemer of Christ exercise authority over Christians, we on account of the boldness of transgressors renew in this general council what the Synod of Toledo (589) wisely enacted in this matter, prohibiting Jews from being given preference in the matter of public offices, since in such capacity they are most troublesome to the Christians. But if anyone should commit such an office to them, let him, after previous warning, be restrained by such punishment as seems proper by the provincial synod which we command to be celebrated every year. The official, however, shall be denied the commercial and other intercourse of the Christians, till in the judgment of the bishop all that he acquired from the Christians from the time he assumed office be restored for the needs of the Christian poor, and the office that he irreverently assumed let him lose with shame. The same we extend also to pagans. [Mansi, IX, 995; Hefele-Leclercq, III, 7.27. This canon 14 of Toledo was frequently renewed.]



CANON 70
Summary. Jews who have received baptism are to be restrained by the prelates from returning to their former rite.

Text. Some (Jews), we understand, who voluntarily approached the waters of holy baptism, do not entirely cast off the old man that they may more perfectly put on the new one, because, retaining remnants of the former rite, they obscure by such a mixture the beauty of the Christian religion. But since it is written: "Accursed is the man that goeth on the two ways" (Ecclus. 2:14), and "a garment that is woven together of woolen and linen" (Deut. 22: ii) ought not to be put on, we decree that such persons be in every way restrained b the prelates from the observance of the former rite, that, having given themselves of their own free will to the Christian religion, salutary coercive action may preserve them in its observance, since not to know the way of the Lord is a lesser evil than to retrace one's steps after it is known.

From H. J. Schroeder, Disciplinary Decrees of the General Councils: Text, Translation and Commentary, (St. Louis: B. Herder, 1937). pp. 236-296.

St. John Chrysostom, the Patriarch of Constantinople (died 406 A.D.) says: "How dare Christians have the slightest intercourse with Jews! They are lustful, rapacious, greedy, perfidious bandits: pests of the universe! Their synagogue is a house of prostitution, the domicile of the devil, as is the soul of the Jew. As a matter of fact, Jews worship the devil; their religion is a disease, their synagogue a an abyss of perdition. The rejection and dispersion of the Jews was done by the wrath of God because of His absolute abandonment of the Jews. God HATES the Jews, and on Judgement Day will say with those who sympathize with them: "Depart from Me, for you have had intercourse with my murderers!" Flee, then, from their assemblies, fly from their houses, and hold their synagogue in hatred and aversion."

St. Augustine says: "Our Lord Jesus Christ referred to Himself as 'the Stone' (St. Mt. 21:44). Lying on the ground, it shakes whoever falls over it; coming from on high, it crushes the proud. The Jews have already been shaken by their previous stumble. What awaits them is to be crushed by His Coming."

St. Barnabas (the student of St. Paul) says: "Do not add to your sins by saying that the Covenant is both theirs and ours. Yes it is ours, but they lost it forever."

St. Vincent Ferrer says: "Since His spouse, the Synagogue, refused to receive Him, Christ answered: "This is a harlot!" and gave her a bill of divorce."

Pope Gregory IX says: "Ungrateful for favors and forgetful of benefits, the Jews return insult for kindness and impious contempt for goodness. They ought to know the yoke of perpetual enslavement because of their guilt. See to it that the perfidious Jews never in the future grow insolent, but that they always suffer publicly the shame of their sin in servile fear."

Pope Innocent III says: "Crucifiers of Christ ought to be held in continual subjection."

St. Thomas Aquinas says: "It would be licit, according to custom, to hold Jews in perpetual servitude because of their crime."

Pope Leo VII says: "Let the Gospel be preached to them and, if they remain obstinate, let them be expelled."

St. Augustine says: "The Jews wander over the entire earth, their backs bent over and their eyes cast downward, forever calling to our minds the curse they carry with them."

Pope Innocent III says: "As wanderers, they (the Jews) must remain upon the earth until their faces are filled with shame and they seek the name of the Lord Jesus Christ."

"Thou shalt eat bread and cover it with the dung that comes out of a man. Thus shall the children of Israel eat their bread all filthy among the nations wither I will cast them out, saith the Lord." (Ezechiel 4:12-13)

"The Jews, who killed both the Lord Jesus and the prophets and have persecuted us, do not please God, and they have become adversaries to all men, to fill up their sin always; for the wrath of God has come upon them to the end." (I Thessalonians 2:14-16)

St. Vincent Ferrer says: "One who dies a Jew will be damned."

St. Justin the Martyr says: "Those of the seed of Abraham who live according to the Law of Moses and who do not believe in Christ before death shall not be saved; especially they who curse this very Christ in the synagogues; who curse everything by which they might obtain salvation and escape the vengeance of fire."

St. Agobard says: "Jews are cursed and covered with malediction. The curse has penetrated them like water in their bowels and oil in their bones. They are cursed in the city and cursed in the country, cursed in their coming in and cursed in their going out. Cursed are the fruits of their loins, of their lands, of their flocks; cursed are their cellars, their granaries, their shops, their food, the very crumbs off their tables!"

"If any man love not Our Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema."
(I Corinthians 16:22)

St. Ambrose says: "O Jewish hearts, harder than rocks!"

"For all the House of Israel is a hard forehead and an obstinate heart." (Ezechiel 3:7)

St. Bernard says: "O intelligence coarse, dense, and cow-like, which did not recognize God even in His own works! Perhaps the Jew will complain that I call his intelligence bovine, but his intelligence is LESS than bovine: 'The ox knows his Owner, and the ass knows his Master's crib, but Israel has not known Me, and My people have not understood.' (Isaiah 1:3) You see, O Jew, I am easier on you than your own prophet!"

St. Bernardine of Feltre says: "Canon Law forbids all intercourse with Jews."

The Council of Elvira declared: "Indeed, if any one of the clergy or faithful has taken a meal with Jews, he is to abstain from Communion so that he may be reformed."

St. Augustine says: "Judaism, since Christ, is a corruption; indeed, Judas (Iscariot) is the image of the Jewish people: their understanding of Scripture is carnal; they bear the guilt for the death of the Savior, for through their fathers they have killed Christ. The Jews held Him; the Jews insulted Him; the Jews bound Him; they crowned Him with thorns; they scourged Him; they hanged Him upon a tree."

St. Gregory of Nyssa says: "Jews are slayers of the Lord, murderers of the prophets, enemies and haters of God, adversaries of grace, enemies of their fathers' faith, advocates of the devil, a brood of vipers, slanderers, scoffers, men of darkened minds, the leaven of Pharisees, a congregation of demons, sinners, wicked men, haters of goodness!"

"Woe to the sinful nation, a people loaded with iniquity, a wicked seed, ungracious children. They have forsaken the Lord, they have blasphemed the Holy One of Israel, they have gone away backwards. And when you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away My eyes from you, saith the Lord; and when you multiply prayer, I will not hear, for your hands are full of blood." (Isaiah 1: 4,15)

St. Basil the Great says: "And such are the prayers of the Jews, for when they stretch forth their hands in prayer, they only remind God-the-Father of their sin against His Son. And at every stretching-forth of their hands, they only make it obvious that they are stained with the blood of Christ. For they who persevere in their blindness inherit the blood-guilt of their fathers, for they cried out: "His blood be on us AND ON OUR CHILDREN" (St. Mt. 27:25)"

St. Alphonsus Liguori says: "Poor Jews! You invoked a dreadful curse upon your own heads; and that curse, miserable race, you carry upon you to this day, and to the End of Time you shall endure the chastisement of that innocent blood!"

ST. JUSTIN, martyr stated in 116 A. D.: "The Jews were behind all the persecutions of the Christians. They wandered through the country everywhere hating and undermining the Christian faith."

February 1, 2003 - St. Ignatius, Bishop & Martyr (Double)
"War Is Not Made with Charity," Says Pope
From: Fr. Moderator

We often hear today that we should compromise with the Novus Ordo, be "charitable," be "oecumenical," be "obedient." Well, that's not what the pope says! When Pope St. Pius X confronted the heresy of Modernism at the turn of the century, what he called the "synthesis of all heresies," he looked it as an enemy and would tolerate no compromise. The Novus Ordoism that took over in the Church after Vatican II is really just Neo-Modernism, a more virulent form of the Modernism that Pope St. Pius X fought and defeated -- temporarily.

In response to the Archbishop of Cremona, who apparently argued that the measures being taken by the pope against the Modernists were excessive, the pope replied in no uncertain terms:

I am astonished that you should find excessive the measures taken to confine the flood that threatens to swamp us, when the [Modernist] error they are striving to spread is much more deadly than that of Luther, because it aims directly at the destruction not only of the Church but of Christianity.

To someone who begged the pope to show pity toward a Modernist, he replied:

They want them [the Modernists] to be treated with oil, soap, and caresses. But they should be beaten with fists. In a duel, you don't count or measure the blows, you strike as you can. War is not made with charity: it is a struggle, a duel. If Our Lord were not to be feared, He would not have given an example in this too. See how he treated the Philistines, the sowers of error, the wolves in sheep's clothing, the traders: He scourged them with whips!