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Crypto-Judaism is the secret adherence toJudaism while publicly professing to be of another faith; practitioners are referred to as "crypto-Jews" (origin from Greekkryptos –κρυπτός, 'hidden').[1]
The term is especially applied historically to Spanish and Portuguese Jews who outwardly professedCatholicism,[2][3][4][5][6] also known asConversos,Marranos, or theAnusim. The phenomenon is especially associated with medieval Spain, following theMassacre of 1391 and theexpulsion of the Jews in 1492.[7] After 1492 in Spain and 1497 in Portugal, officially they no longer existed. TheSpanish Inquisition and thePortuguese Inquisition were established to monitor converted Jews and Muslims and their descendants for their continued adherence to Christian faith and practice, with severe penalties for those convicted of secretly continuing to practice their original beliefs. Information about secretly observant Jews largely survives in Inquisition cases against individuals.[8]
Officially, Jews who converted in Spain during the 14th and 15th centuries were known asCristianos Nuevos (New Christians) but were commonly calledconversos (converts to Christianity). Spain and Portugal issued edicts restricting their rights in the mother countries of Spain and Portugal and Spanish and Portuguese overseas territories in the Americas.
Although onlyCristianos Viejos (Old Christians) who could provelimpieza de sangre ("cleanliness or purity of blood") descended from Christian Iberian European ancestry only, without "tainting" of any Jewish ancestry or Muslim Berber/Arab ancestry, were allowed to officially migrate to the New World Spanish possessions, many Christianconversos with Jewish antecedents went to the Spanish possessions, using forgedlimpieza de sangre documents, or they entered the Spanish possessions via Portuguese Brazil, particularly 1580–1640 when Spain and Portugal were ruled by the same monarch. The entry requirements to the Portuguese colony of Brazil were more lax and also less rigorously enforced.
Despite the dangers of theSpanish Inquisition in Iberia and the Inquisitions established in Mexico City; Lima, Peru; and Cartagena de Indias in what is now Colombia, manyconversos continued to secretly and discreetly practice Jewish rituals in the home.[7][9][10]
After theAlhambra decree of March 1492, which mandated conversion to Christianity or exile for Jews, numerousconversos, also calledXueta (or Chueta) in theBalearic Islands ruled by Spain, publicly professedRoman Catholicism but privately adhered to Judaism, even throughout theSpanish Inquisition.
The "Belmonte Jews" of Portugal, dating from the 12th century, maintained strong secret traditions for centuries. A whole community survived in secrecy by maintaining a tradition of endogamous marriage and hiding all external signs of their faith. They and their practices were discovered only in the 20th century. Their rich Sephardic tradition of crypto-Judaism is unique. Some now profess Orthodox Judaism, although many still retain their centuries-old traditions.[11]
As one of the towering figures in Judaism and the author of theMishneh Torah commentary on theTalmud,Maimonides also issued a landmark doctrinal response to the forced conversions of Jews in the Iberian peninsula by theAlmohads:
In hisEpistle on Martyrdom, however, Maimonides suggested that the persecuted Jew should publicly adopt Islam while maintaining crypto-Judaism and not seek martyrdom unless forced to transgress Jewish commandments in public. He also excoriated one writer, who advocated martyrdom, for "long-winded foolish babbling and nonsense" and for misleading and hurting the Jews. In a sweeping view of the Jewish past, Maimonides marshals examples of heretics and sinners from the Bible to show that even oppressors of Israel were rewarded by God for a single act of piety or respect. How much greater then, he argues, will be the reward of the Jews "who despite the exigencies of forced conversion perform commandments secretly."[12]
Maimonides championed rationalism over the then-accepted practice of martyrdom when facing religious adversity. This consequently legitimized crypto-Judaism by the religion's standards and provided doctrinal backing for Jews during the centuries of the Spanish Inquisition (1478–1834).
According to theEncyclopaedia Judaica,[13] several incidents of forced conversions happened prior to 1492 and outside of Iberia. One of the earliest conversions happened a century after theFall of Rome and was inClermont-Ferrand. After a member of theJewish community in Clermont-Ferrand became aJewish Christian and was persecuted by other members of the community for doing so, the cavalcade in which he was marching persecuted his persecutors in turn:
The participants in the procession then made an attack "which destroyed [the synagogue] completely, razing it to the grounds." Subsequently, Bishop *Avitus directed a letter to the Jews in which he disclaimed the use of compulsion to make them adopt Christianity, but announced at the end of the missive: "Therefore if ye be ready to believe as I do, be one flock with us, and I shall be your pastor; but if ye be not ready, depart from this place." The community hesitated for three days before making a decision. Finally the majority, some 500, accepted Christianity. The Christians in Clermont greeted the event with rejoicing: "Candles were lit, the lamps shone, the whole city radiated with the light of the snow-white flock" (i.e., the forced converts). The Jews who preferred exile left for *Marseilles (Gregory of Tours, Histories, 5:11). The poet Venantius Fortunatus composed a poem to commemorate the occasion. In 582 the Frankish king Chilperic compelled numerous Jews to adopt Christianity. Again the anusim were not wholehearted in their conversion, for "some of them, cleansed in body but not in heart, denied God, and returned to their ancient perfidy, so that they were seen keeping the Sabbath, as well as Sunday" (ibid., 6:17).
The Clermont-Ferrand conversions preceded the first forced conversions in Iberia by 40 years. Forced baptisms of Jews took place in Iberia in 616 at the insistence of Visigoth monarchSisibut:
Persistent attempts to enforce conversion were made in the seventh century by the Visigoths in Spain after they had adopted the Roman Catholic faith. Comparatively mild legal measures were followed by the harsh edict issued by King Sisibut in 616, ordering the compulsory baptism of all Jews. After conversion, however, the anusim evidently maintained their Jewish cohesion and religious life. It was undoubtedly this problem that continued to occupy Spanish sovereigns at the successive Councils of Toledo representing both the ecclesiastical and secular authorities...Thus, steps were taken to secure that the children of converts had a Christian religious education as well as to prevent the older generation from continuing to observe the Jewish rites or from failing to observe the Catholic ones. A system of strict supervision by the clergy over the way of life and movements of the anusim was imposed...
TheNeofiti were a group of crypto-Jews living in theKingdom of Sicily, which included all of Southern Italy from the 13th to the 16th centuries.[14]
The ancestral lineSus,Süßkind andLindauer was a crypto-Jewish susitic ancestral line that settled in theHoly Roman Empire and lived as Catholic or Protestant crypto-Jews.[15] Secondary lineages of theLindauer are: Lindauere, Lindouer, Lindaer, Linduaer, Lindeaur, Lindeauer, Lindhauer, Linndauer, Lindayer as well as Lindaurr.[16] There are some modern Susiti living in the United States, with two verified families: one in Mariah Hill, Indiana[17]and another in Mid-Coast Maine. Susiti rituals from the Protestant tradition, as practiced by the Susiti in Maine, are similar to those of theKaraites and mainly consist of readings from thePsalms andHebrew Scriptures. The prayers typically involve stepping three steps backward and then forward while reciting Psalm 84:5, followed byPsalm 3 in the morning andPsalm 4 in the evening then theShema This is then followed by a full repetition ofPsalm 145 and the which is called the“Holy Prayer” fromKings 8:22–61 the prayers conclude with a repetition of“Who is like You?”,the Song of Anna,Psalm 60, andPsalm 137, every prayer concludes with "Selah" due to the literal reading of the end of each Psalm and the false pretense that it was an equivalent toAmen.[18]
There have been several communities of crypto-Jews in Muslim lands. The ancestors of theDaggatuns in Morocco are thought to have kept up their Jewish practices a long time after their nominal adoption of Islam. In Iran, a large community of crypto-Jews lived inMashhad, nearKhorassan, where they were known as"Jedid al-Islam"; they were mass-converted to Islam around 1839 after theAllahdad events. Most of this community left for Israel in 1946. Some converted to Islam and remained in Iran.[19][20]
In 1494, after the signing of theTreaty of Tordesillas, authorized byPope Alexander VI, Portugal was given the right to found colonies in the Eastern Hemisphere. In his lecture at theLibrary of Congress, ProfessorSanjay Subrahmanyam, Chair in Social Sciences atUniversity of California, Los Angeles, explains that crypto-Jews were especially attracted to India because not only was it a center of trade, but India had established ancient Jewish settlements along its Western coast. The presence of these communities meant that crypto-Jews, who had been forced to acceptCatholicism but did not want to emigrate to tolerant countries (e.g. Morocco, Poland, Ottoman Empire, etc.), could operate within thePortuguese Empire with the full freedom of Catholic subjects but away from theInquisition while collaborating with existing Jewish communities to hide their true beliefs.[21]
The presence of crypto-Jews in Goa angered the Archbishop of Goa, DomGaspar Jorge de Leão Pereira, and other Europeans likeFrancis Xavier who wrote polemics and letters toLisbon urging that the Inquisition be brought to Goa.[22] Crypto-Jews presented a security threat to the Kingdom of Portugal, because Sephardic Jews had an established reputation in Iberia for joining forces withMoors to overthrow Christian rulers.[23] TheGoan Inquisition commenced in 1560 and ended in 1812. It targeted crypto-Jews,crypto-Muslims, andcrypto-Hindus. Of the 1,582 persons convicted between 1560 and 1623, 45.2% were convicted for offenses related to Judaism and Islam.[24] A compilation of the auto-da-fé statistics of the Goa Inquisition reveal that a total of 57 persons were burnt in the flesh and 64 in effigy (i.e. a statue resembling the person). All the burnt were convicted as relapsed heretics or for sodomy.[25]
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Crypto-Judaism was documented chiefly in Spanish-held colonial territories in northernMexico. Numerous conversos joined Spanish and Portuguese expeditions, believing there was an economic opportunity in the new lands, and that they would have more freedom at a distance far from Iberia. Different situations developed in the early colonial period of Mexico, the frontier province ofNuevo León, the later northern frontier provinces, and the colonial experience of theMexican Inquisition. The crypto-Jewish traditions have complex histories and are typically embedded in an amalgam of syncretic Roman Catholic and Judaic traditions. In many ways resurgent Judaic practices mirrored indigenous peoples' maintaining their traditions practiced loosely under a Roman Catholic veil. In addition, Catholicism was syncretic, absorbing other traditions and creating a new creole religion.
The traditionalFestival of Santa Esterica was preserved among the Conversos who migrated to the New World and is still practiced today among their descendants.
Some of the Sephardic Jews expelled from Spain went to Portugal, but in 1497 that country effectively converted all remaining Jewish children, making them wards of the state unless the parents also converted. Therefore, many of the early crypto-Jewish migrants to Mexico in the early colonial days were technically first to second-generation Portuguese with Spanish roots before that. The number of such Portuguese migrants was significant enough that Spanish colonists began to use "Portuguese" as a synonym for "Jewish" for their settlers.Immigration to Mexico offered lucrative trade possibilities in a well-populated colony with nascent Spanish culture. Some migrants believed that this region would be more tolerant since the lands were overwhelmingly populated by non-Christian indigenous peoples and it was far removed from the metropole.[26]
Colonial officials believed that many crypto-Jews were going to Mexico during the 16th century and complained in written documents to Spain that Spanish society in Mexico would become significantly Jewish. Officials found and condemned clandestine synagogues in Mexico City. At this point, colonial administrators institutedthe Law of the Pure Blood, which prohibited migration to Mexico forNew Christians (Cristiano Nuevo), i.e. anyone who could not prove to be Old Christians for at least the last three generations. In addition, the administration initiated theMexican Inquisition to ensure the Catholic orthodoxy of all migrants to Mexico. The Mexican Inquisition was also deployed in the traditional manner to ensure orthodoxy of converted indigenous peoples. The first victims of burnings (orautos de fé) of the Mexican Inquisition were indigenous converts convicted of heresy or crypto-Jews convicted of relapsing into their ancestral faith.[citation needed]
Except for those allowed to settle the province ofNuevo Leon under an exemption from the Blood Purity Laws, the number of conversos migrating to the New World was reduced.
The colonization of New Spain took place as a northward expansion over increasingly harsh geography, in regions that were occupied by tribes angered at the encroachment; they formed loose confederations of indigenous peoples to resist the settlers. Spain financed the expansion by exploiting mineral wealth, enslaving, or forcing indigenous peoples to labor in mines. It establishedencomiendas for raising livestock, thereby displacing the local people. The indigenous peoples of the North-Eastern quadrant ofNew Spain (Nueva España) proved particularly resistant to colonial pressures. TheChichimec,Apache, and other tribes resisted conversion to Christianity and avoided being impressed as laborers or slaves on Spanish ranches and in mines. The Spanish believed such peoples made the frontier (frontera) a lawless region.
Luis Carvajal y de la Cueva, a royal accountant, was a PortugueseNew Christian. He received a royal charter from the Spanish Crown to settleNuevo León, a large expanse of land in the hostile frontier. Because of the dangers and difficulties of this region, Carvajal y de la Cueva received an exemption in his charter from the usual requirement that he prove that all new settlers were "Old Christians" (of at least three generations) rather than recently converted Jews or Muslims. This exemption allowed people to go to Nuevo León who were legally barred from enteringNew Spain elsewhere.[27] Carvajal was authorized to bring 100 soldiers and 60 laborers to New Spain; many have been documented as crypto-Jews.[28]
With Carvajal as governor,Monterrey was established as the center (now in the state of Nuevo León). Within a few years, some people reported to authorities in Mexico City that Jewish rites were being performed in the Northern Province and efforts to convert heathen indigenous peoples were lax.[29] The principal economic activity of Carvajal and his associates seems to have been capturingIndians and selling them into slavery.[29] Carvajal's Lieutenant Governor,Gaspar Castaño de Sosa, led a large expedition toNew Mexico in 1591 in an effort to establish a colony. Castaño was arrested for this unauthorized expedition and sentenced to exile in thePhilippines. The sentence was later reversed, but he had already been killed in theMolucca Islands when the Chinese slaves on his ship mutinied.[30]
Governor Carvajal, his immediate family members, and others of his entourage were called to appear before the Inquisition in Mexico City. They were arrested and jailed. The governor subsequently died in jail, prior to a sentence of exile. His niece Isabel Carvajal had been tortured and implicated all the family in so-called charges. They were all executed byburning at the stake for relapsing into Judaism, except for one nephew who escaped arrest by fleeing to Italy, and one nephew who was a Dominican friar.[31] His nephew, also namedLuis, wrote the earliest-known writings by a Jew in the Americas.[32]
When Carvajal was in office, the city of Monterrey became a destination for other crypto-Jews who wanted to escape the Mexican Inquisition in the south of the territory. Thus, Nuevo León and the founding of Monterrey are significant as they attracted crypto-Jewish migrants from all parts ofNew Spain. They created one of the earliest Jewish-related communities in Mexico. (The Jewish communities in modern Mexico, which practice their Judaism openly, were not established until the late 19th and early 20th centuries, after considerable immigration of Ashkenazi Jews from eastern Europe, andMizrahi Jews from Turkey and Syria.)
Due to the Inquisition activities in Nuevo León, many crypto-Jewish descendants migrated to frontier colonies further west, using the trade routes passing through the towns of the Sierra Madre Occidental and Chihuahua, Hermosillo and Cananea, and to the north on the trade route toPaso del Norte andSanta Fe (both cities in the colonialSanta Fe de Nuevo Mexico). Some even traveled toAlta California on the Pacific Coast.
In the late 20th century, in modern-daySouthwestern United States specificallyNew Mexico, which was a former territory of New Spain, severalHispanos of New Mexico have stated a belief that they are descended from crypto-Jews of the colonial period. While most maintain their Roman Catholic and Christian faiths, they often cite as evidence memories of older relatives practicing Jewish traditions. Since the 1990s, the crypto-Jews of New Mexico have been extensively studied and documented by several research scholars, including Stanley M. Hordes,[33] Janet Liebman Jacobs,[34]Schulamith Halevy,[35] and Seth D. Kunin, who calls themHispanos.[36] Kunin noted that most of this group in New Mexico has not formally embraced Judaism nor joined the organized Jewish community.[37] Though some have been sceptical, such as Folklorist Judith Neulander arguing that people could be referring to traditions of modernAshkenazi Jews migrants andEvangelical ProtestantChristians who purposely acquired and employed Jewish traditions.[38] More recently,Evangelical ProtestantChristians have opened missionary groups aimed at cultivating evangelical doctrine in Southwestern American communities where crypto-Judaism had survived. The highly influential Hordes has been charged with "single-minded speculation based on largely ephemeral or highly ambiguous evidence" for his conclusion that modern-day Hispanos who claim crypto-Jewish roots are heirs to an unbroken chain of transmission.[39] Kunin responded to some of this criticism in his bookJuggling Identities: Identity and Authenticity Among the Crypto-Jews, in the response Kunin iterated that these scholars were misunderstanding New Mexican identity which, while authentically tied to Christian and Pueblo historicity, is in line with other Spanishconverso histories.
In the department ofAntioquia,Colombia, as well as in the greaterPaisa region, some families also hold traditions and oral accounts of Jewish descent. In this population, Y-DNA genetic analysis has shown an origin of male founders predominantly from "southern Spain but also suggest that a fraction came from northern Iberia and that some possibly had a Sephardic origin".[40]Medellín has a tradition of themarranada, where apig is slaughtered, butchered and consumed on the streets of every neighborhood eachChristmas. This custom has been interpreted as an annual affirmation of the rejection of Jewish law.[41]
A safe haven destination forSephardicConversos during the Spanish colonial era wasSanta Cruz de la Sierra.[42] In 1557 many crypto-Jews joinedÑuflo de Chávez and were among the pioneers who founded the city.[43] During the 16th century more crypto-Jews that faced persecution from the Inquisition and local authorities in nearbyPotosí,La Paz andLa Plata moved to Santa Cruz, as it was the most isolated urban settlement and because the Inquisition did not bother theConversos there;[44] Some settled in the city of Santa Cruz and its adjacent towns, includingVallegrande, Postrervalle,Portachuelo, Terevinto,Pucará, andCotoca.[45]
Several of the oldest Catholic families in Santa Cruz are of Jewish ancestry; some families still practice certain traditions of Judaism. As recently as the 1920s, several families preserved seven-branched candlesticks and served dishes cooked withkosher practices.[44] It is still customary among certain old families to light candles on Friday at sunset and to mourn the deaths of close relatives by sitting on the floor.[43] After almost five centuries, some of the descendants of these families acknowledge having some Jewish ancestry, but practice Catholicism.
In addition to these communities, Roman Catholic-professing communities descended from male and female crypto-Jews are said to exist inthe Dominican Republic,Cuba,Jamaica, Puerto Rico[46] and in various other countries ofSouth America, such asBrazil (see Synagogue Kahal Zur Israel in Recife),Argentina,Uruguay,Venezuela,Chile,Peru andEcuador. From these communities comes the proverb, "Catholic by faith, Jewish by blood".[citation needed]
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Singer, Isidore; et al., eds. (1901–1906).The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.{{cite encyclopedia}}:Missing or empty|title= (help)| History | |||
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