Until the Holocaust, the Spanish Inquisition was the defining moment of the Jewish Diaspora.
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Until the Holocaust, the Spanish Inquisition was the defining moment of the Jewish Diaspora. And that it ultimately happened on Tisha B’Av, the date of the destruction of both Jewish Temples and the sacking of Jerusalem in 70 CE was a reminder of the level of tragedy.
I don’t think the news articles I was greeted with this morning, involving non-peer reviewed DNA claims involving Sephardic Jewry really considered the years of forced conversions, the awful Spanish treatment of even the “New Christians,” or the actual ramifications of pushing yet another tenuous genetic claim in the context of a time of the end of the Sephardic Golden Age and the destruction of the Spanish Sephardic Jewish community, something that harmed both Jews and Spain for generations.
But that’s unsurprising. What’s the need for historical context when you have an agenda to pursue?
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On July 31, 1492, which coincided with Tisha B’Av, after years of attempted forced conversions, threats and pogroms, Ferdinand and Isabella expelled the Sephardic Jews of Spain as their “final solution.” They and Spanish citizens stole these people’s life work, forcing them to sell their homes and assets for a pittance of their worth. Forced onto ships, mostly to the Ottoman Empire (yet, also prohibited from returning from exile by the Sultan to their homeland and only allowed to go to other portions of the Ottoman Empire), this expulsion saw horrors unimaginable. Believing that the Jews had swallowed any gold or gems they had to take some wealth with them, it was not uncommon for sailors to slice open the stomachs of the Jews in their ships once they were over water. Jewish women were forcibly and violently raped. The exile was bathed in blood.
And those that escaped to Portugal only delayed their suffering, as Ferdinand and Isabella successfully encouraged Manuel I to expel Jews from there in 1496.
