A.D. 1400-1500.
THE JEWS IN SPAIN.
The scenes of violence and bloodshed which had been provoked by the
fanatic zeal of the Archdeacon of Ecija were a foretaste of the
fearful tragedy which was to take place in Spain in the ensuing
century. But it can hardly be said that he occasioned it. The evil
had long been gathering, and must have broken out, sooner or later,
in Spain. He may have precipitated it, but nothing more.
The main cause of the mischief was, beyond doubt, the improvidence
and want of steady industry among the people. In all business
transactions they were continually applying to the Jews, unable, as
it seemed, to buy or sell, to sow or reap, without resorting to them.
The result was the pauperizing of all classes of the community except
the Jews, who continued to heap up enormous wealth.[151] The people
would not believe that this was the result of their own improvidence,
and that there could be no remedy for it except in persistent
industry and prudence. They made repeated complaints of having been
overreached and defrauded; but, when the cases were inquired into in
a court of law, it was found that nothing could be proved against the
alleged offenders. This only fomented the growing discontent. To all
thoughtful observers it was evident that a popular convulsion could
not be far distant.
Henry III. died in 1406, and was succeeded by his son John II., an
infant not two years old. Early in his reign Vincentius Ferrer, a
Dominican, made his appearance as an itinerant preacher in Castile
and Aragon, calling on the Jews to renounce their ancient faith,
and accept that of Christ. He was a man of the most ardent zeal,
indefatigable energy, and burning eloquence; and the stern asceticism
of his life caused him to be regarded as a saint. His fierce
invectives against the impiety and obstinacy of the Jews exasperated
the people against them; and it very soon became evident that there
were for them two alternatives only—conversion or destruction.
Vincent went from town to town, carrying a crucifix in one hand and a
copy of the Mosaic Law in the other, followed everywhere by an armed
rabble, who maltreated and murdered all who refused to hearken. Many
of the Jews embraced, or pretended to embrace, Christianity. Many
more abandoned all their worldly possessions, and fled to Barbary;
some also to Portugal,[152] and other Christian States. Some would
neither abjure their faith nor fly, and their descendants underwent
the terrible consequences of their parents’ constancy. Ferrer is said
to have converted 35,000, or, according to others, 50,000 Jews. Even
a Hebrew authority places it at 20,000. How many of these converts
were real believers in Christ we shall have occasion subsequently to
inquire.
In 1406 the old charge of insulting the Host was revived, though
with some variation in the circumstances. Some Jews were accused
of having bought the consecrated wafer from the sacristan of the
cathedral at Segovia. They threw it into a caldron of boiling water,
when it rose to the surface. Alarmed at the sight, they wrapped it in
a cloth, and gave it to a Dominican friar, who informed the bishop
of the occurrence. The bishop caused the Jews to be arrested and
tortured. Among them was Don Meir, the king’s physician. The torture
not only elicited a confession of the particular crime charged on the
sufferers, but of the murder of the late king by poison. Don Meir and
the others were drawn and quartered at Segovia; soon after which it
was discovered that the whole charge was a fabrication.
Another similar story is related about the same time. A nobleman, who
bore a bitter dislike to a bishop, bribed his cook to poison him.
The conspiracy was discovered, and the cook put on the rack; but he
would not confess the name of his suborner. By the advice of the
latter, the next time he was racked he declared it was the Jews who
had bribed him. This was instantly credited; and, as he had named no
particular persons as his accomplices, a great many Jews were put to
death on suspicion.
In 1412 the queen-regent Catherine promulgated a series of ordinances
against the Jews, equalling in severity anything that had been issued
before. They were not to be physicians or surgeons; they were not
to sell bread, wine, or any other provisions; they were to keep
no Christian servants; were not to eat and drink with Christians,
or attend Christian marriages or funerals; they were to live in
the Jewries or ghettoes only, and these were to be surrounded with
a high wall, having only one entrance-gate; they were to wear a
carefully prescribed dress of very common material; and any Jew or
Jewess who ventured to put on costly attire was liable to have the
whole stripped off their backs. They were not permitted to change
their place of residence, and were allowed neither to shave their
beards nor cut their hair! No Christian woman was to enter the Jewish
quarter, on pain of a heavy fine, if her character was respectable,
or of being whipped out of it, if it was not! Finally, they were not
to be smiths, carpenters, tailors, shoemakers, curriers, clothiers,
or to sell any of the goods made by these, except to Jews.
In 1413 the Antipope, Benedict XIII., convened an assembly at
Tortosa, for the purpose of presiding at a disputation between
certain chosen advocates of Judaism on one side, and of Christianity
on the other—the subjects of discussion being, whether the Messiah
had already come, and what was the value of the Jewish Talmud.
Considering who were to be the judges, it is no great wonder that
the Jews were anxious to decline the discussion. But this they were
not suffered to do. The Christian champions were Jerome of Santa Fe,
Beltran, Bishop of Barcelona, and Garcia Alvares—all of them able men
and converts from Judaism. Sixteen learned Talmudists appeared for
the Jews. Sixty-nine meetings were held; and it is almost unnecessary
once more to add that both parties claimed the victory. A bull
was issued by the Pope, commanding the burning of the Talmud, and
imposing fresh penalties on such Jews as remained unconverted. It
appears, however, that large numbers submitted to baptism.
In 1420 the young king assumed the regal authority, and held it till
1454. During his reign the Jews seem to have been, comparatively
speaking, unmolested; and, as was always the case under such
circumstances, to have regained both their wealth and their political
influence. In 1435 the Jews at Palma were charged with the old stock
offence of crucifying children, though this time the victim was a
Moor. They confessed, as usual, under torture, and, having agreed
to accept baptism, were pardoned. In Toledo, in 1441, the Infante
Henry, who was in rebellion against his father, being greatly in
want of money to pay his troops, was advised to plunder the houses
of the Jews—both those who adhered to their old creed and those
who had recently been converted—as the surest and most popular mode
of raising funds. He greatly approved of the counsel, and proceeded
straightway to follow it, notwithstanding the opposition of the
principal citizens and the clergy. The populace, we are told,
followed his example. In 1445 the Jews of the same city were accused
of having undermined the streets through which the procession of the
Host was to pass; and one of the customary massacres would have taken
place, if the authorities had not made inquiry and ascertained that
the charge was wholly without foundation. Again, at Tavora, some
youths, after one of their feasts, sallied forth into the streets,
and slew several Jews whom they met, their excuse being that they
thought the Jews were on the point of making an attack upon _them_.
A similar story to that propagated at Palma was also fabricated at
Valladolid of some Jews at Savona. But in no case did any of the
wholesale massacres take place by which the Spanish cities were
disgraced both in previous and after times.
In 1454 Henry IV. succeeded his father. His action at Toledo,
thirteen years before, in plundering the Jews, caused the idea to be
entertained that he would be unfavourable to them; but his conduct,
when he came to the throne, did not bear out the notion. A riot
having occurred in 1461 at Medina del Campo, in consequence of the
preaching of an enthusiastic monk; and a number of Jews having been
slain and their property pillaged, Henry put the outbreak down, and
executed due justice on the rioters. He also appointed a Jew, Gaon
by name, as his finance minister, and sent him to levy the taxes in
the Basque provinces. But this was regarded by the Basques as an
infringement of their constitutional rights. The Jew was assassinated
in the streets of Tolosa; and when the king sent to require the
surrender of the murderers, he received a defiant refusal, nor did he
venture to take any measures against them.
It was evident that the feeling against the Jews was once more
growing to the fatal height it had attained in other lands. In 1468
the Jews of Sepulveda, a town near Segovia, had, it was averred,
seized on a Christian infant, carried it to a sequestered spot, and
there, after barbarous ill-usage, crucified it. Their Rabbi, Solomon
Picho, was declared to have been the instigator of the deed. The
Bishop of Avila put the accused, sixteen in number, to the torture,
and having elicited the usual confession, caused some to be burned
and some hanged. But these severities did not satisfy the people of
Sepulveda, who required the extermination of the Jews. They rose
accordingly, and massacred all who did not save themselves by flight.
Similar insurrections took place in Cordova, Jaen, Toledo, Segovia,
and other cities.
The spirit thus evoked was allayed for a time—probably because
Henry not only lent it no help, but was in his heart favourably
inclined to the Jews. A deputation, composed of converts to
Christianity and those who still professed their ancient faith,
residing in Valladolid, waited on him, to ask his protection against
the oppression and injustice of the partisans of his sister Donna
Isabella, and were kindly received. Though no satisfaction was given
them for the wrongs they had undergone, injustice for the future was
restrained. When at a Cortes, held in 1469, a petition was presented
to him, praying him to forbid the Jews thenceforward to farm or
collect tithes, he paid no heed to it. But the spirit of persecution
was checked for a time only. In 1473 it broke out again, and deluged
all Andalusia with blood. A new feature was now manifested, likely
to produce the gravest consequences. The storm of persecution had
hitherto fallen on those only who persisted in refusing to adopt the
Christian faith. But persons were now included in it who had lately
become converts to the Church, and who were known by the title of
the ‘New Christians.’ Their fidelity to their new belief was greatly
suspected; and, it cannot be denied, with a good deal of reason. And,
besides, these New Christians were, after all, guilty of that gravest
of all Jewish offences—acquiring wealth at the expense of the old
Christians. The mobs in the Andalusian cities attacked old and new
Jews alike. In Jaen, the constable of the town, Franza by name, who
interfered to protect them, was assassinated while hearing mass in
the cathedral itself, and the pillage and murder went on unchecked.
The example was soon followed in Castile. In Segovia, in 1474, Don
Juan de Pachecho, wishing to provoke a rising for the execution of a
political intrigue, thought the most likely mode of succeeding was by
exciting an armed attack on the converted Jews, it being easy then to
divert the rabble to his purpose. The insurrection was put down by
the royal forces, but not before great numbers of the Jews had been
slain.
Henry died in the same year, 1474, and was succeeded by his sister
Isabella. Her title to the crown was doubtful, as there was a
daughter of Henry’s second queen, named Juana, who, if legitimate,
was the rightful heir. But the whole nation seemed to have concurred
in rejecting Juana’s claim; and, though her cause was taken up by
the King of Portugal, to whom she had given her hand, his complete
defeat at Toro extinguished her hopes for ever. Five years afterwards
Ferdinand succeeded to the crown of Aragon, and his union with
Isabella may be said to have created anew the long extinct monarchy
of Spain.
In the following year a Cortes was held at Toledo, and many laws
were enacted for the government of the now united kingdoms. Among
these was an ordinance, that not only should the Jews be compelled
to reside within the bounds of their own Jewry or ghetto, but also
that any Jew who should presume to live elsewhere should forfeit
all his property, and his person be at the disposal of the king.
In other respects the regulations passed were neither oppressive
nor unreasonable. Within the bounds of their ghetto, all privileges
which of late years they had been permitted to enjoy were allowed
them. But shortly after Ferdinand’s accession to the united throne of
Castile and Aragon, he introduced into his dominions a new engine for
the oppression of the Jews, the infamous Inquisition, the working
of which produced more momentous and terrible consequences than
he himself, in all likelihood, foresaw; which culminated, indeed,
not only in the misery and ruin of the Jews, but in the decay and
degradation of Spain herself.
This was the era of the famous Isaac Abarbanel, the favourite
minister of Alphonso V., of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, and
of Ferdinand, King of Naples. He was distinguished, not only as a
statesman, but as an author. He wrote valuable commentaries on the
Pentateuch and the Prophets, as well as many other works. Jacob
Mantenu also, physician to Paul III., and the Latin translator of
Maimonides, belongs to this century.
FOOTNOTES:
[151] A similar state of things exists in South Russia to-day.
[152] Hearing, it may be, of this, Ferrer besought permission of the
King of Portugal to enter his dominions, as the messenger of Heaven.
The king replied, he was welcome to come, but he must first prove his
mission by putting on a crown of red-hot iron! Ferrer declined to
avail himself of this offer!