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Professor Newt's Distorted History Lesson

8
Gus8/07/2010 11:31:12 am PDT

You can also read more about what happened with Spanish Jews after the reconquista here: The Virtual Jewish History Tour - Spain

Excerpt:

Massacre of 1391

Under the rule of John I (1379-1390), things grew even worse for the Jewish community of Spain. Jewish courts were forbidden from calling for capital punishment, Jews were forced to change prayers deemed offensive to the Church, and people were forbidden to convert to Judaism on pain of becoming property of the State. Anti-Semitic violence also increased during this period, and Jews were often beaten or even killed in the streets.

A revolt broke out in Seville after the death of King John I in 1390, leading to a period of disorder which greatly affected the Jewish community of Spain in the coming years. On Ash Wednesday 1391, Ferrand Martinez, the Archdeacon of Ecija, urged Christians to kill or baptize the Jews of Spain. On June 6, the mob attacked the Juderia in Seville from all sides and murdered 4,000 Jews; the rest submitted to baptism as the only means of escaping death. The riots then spread across the countryside destroying many synagogues and murdering thousands of Jews in the streets. During the months-long riots, the Cordova Juderia was burned down and over 5,000 Jews ruthlessly murdered regardless of age or sex. Again, more Jews converted as the only way to escape death.

Soon after, a series of laws were passed to reduce the Jews to poverty and further humiliate them. Under these laws, the Jews were ordered to:

1) Live by themselves in enclosed Juderias;
2) Banned from practicing medicine, surgery, or chemistry;
3) Banned from selling commodities such as bread, wine, flour, meat, etc.;
4) Banned from engaging in handicrafts or trades of any kind;
5) Forbidden to hire Christian servants, farm hands, lamplighters, or gravediggers;
6) Banned from eating drinking, bathing, holding intimate conversation with, visiting, or giving presents to Christians;
7) Banned from holding public offices or acting as money-brokers or agents;
8) Christian women, married or unmarried, were forbidden to enter the Juderia either by day or by night;
9) Allowed no self-jurisdiction whatever, nor might they, without royal permission, levy taxes for communal purposes;
10) Forbidden to assume the title of “Don”;
11) Forbidden to carry arms;
12) Forbidden to trim beard or hair;
13) Jewesses were required to wear plain, long garments of coarse material reaching to the feet, and Jews were forbidden to wear garments made of fine material;
14) On pain of loss of property and even of slavery, Jews were forbidden to leave the country, and any grandee or knight who protected or sheltered a fugitive Jew was punished with a fine of 150,000 maraveds for the first offense.

These laws were strictly enforced, and calculated to compel the Jews to embrace Christianity.