THE SPANISH JEWS APOSTATED IN MASS IN CASTILLA IN THE 14TH CENTURY

 DON SEM TOB THE RABBI OF CARRIÓN MORAL PROVERBS

 

That Teigitur December morning was cold with the first frosts and the trees shedding their yellow livery. Litter in the parks.

The seasons followed their planetary turns immutably. They never stopped in their march, undaunted by the joys and sorrows, the triumphs, the failures, the deaths, the births, the crimes, the abortions, and the heroics of men. God or Yahweh or Eloy, as the Jews who feel terrified at his name want to call him, he may have been up there ruling the empyrean but he was silent. This silence plunged some noble and inquisitive souls into a paroxysm of indignation against the advice of the rabbis who recommend sticking to reality and not wanting to delve too deeply into the lofty mysteries of the universe. This is what today, little ones.

To Teigitur, who, moved by his exalted curiosity, sought unanswered questions, this advice (learned ignorance, behold, it was always said that knowledge brings pain) drove him crazy.

That morning, Teigitur, was the day of Saint Bibiana, vestal virgin and martyr of the Parthenon.

Which a henchman tried to force, and she preferred to die in torment, rather than deny Xto. And lose chastity.

 The old man, after saying his mass by the Latin rite and singing the stagiris and psalms of the office, was in a good humor.

He'd found a book in the attics of his dusty library written by a brilliant University of Pittsburgh professor he'd met when he lived in New York.

It was an introduction to the work and methodology of The Proverbs of Don Sem Tob. That poet of the court of Alfonso XI author of those famous verses:

"The hawk is not worth less

to be born in a ruinous nest

no less examples

for telling them a Jew"

Teigitur was always intrigued and disturbed by the Jewish theme.

 Not in vain was he born near the arches of the Puerta del Socorro in Segovia, at the foot of the San Roque steps that led to the old Jewish quarter.

Now many Spaniards in step with the course of the airs that run in the world and especially in Spain where a political order or regime with a Sanhedrite bias prevails, they want to see his last name on the list of the chosen ones. Everyone wants to be first when Judgment Day comes.

They are again the shocks of Schindler's list although in reverse.

 The fact is that Professor Shepard validated Don Teigitur's thesis and corroborated: in the fourteenth century, in the face of great social convulsions, the desire for prosperity and power due to circumspection or skepticism, there had been a mass conversion of the Jewish quarters. Castilian and Andalusian

 So much so that the converts become bishops, cardinals, founders of religious orders, canonries and ministries. Only a small group of 99 percent accepted the edict of expulsion of the Catholic Monarchs in 1492 even though they continued to observe the Old Law in their homes. They abstained from the jalufo because Moses considered the pig an unclean animal, they ate truffle meat, that is, without blood, and to keep the Sabbath on Fridays they prepared the adafina or rotten pot from which the Castilian stew is derived.

 Raquel and Ester were renamed María, Emmanuel Manolos.

 By surnames they chose plant names Manzano, Parra, Escobar or names of the towns they inhabited such as Arévalo, Coca, Cuellar etc.

Sepharad was baptized en masse.

Now (paradoxes of history) the movement is in reverse. Renouncing Catholicism, everyone wants to belong to the chosen people, since it is well known that a large part of the conquerors and colonizers of Hispanic America were of converted origin.

 Imbued with the messianic dream, they sought the Promised Land, the fountains of eternal youth where milk and honey flowed.

 Here is one of the great enigmas of Castilian history.

Spain was never a racist people but it was very classist. Land of coats of arms, lineages and ringorrango.

This stems perhaps from that pride of the Israelite race to belong to the elect. Intellectually very gifted for mathematics and speculative sciences, they were always superior to others.

 At this point in the game, it is presumed to come from the tribe of David or from the leg of El Cid.

Contravening the pride of the Pharisees, Christ said: "From these stones my Father can make children of Abraham" as wanting to convey the message that we all come from Adam and Eve and the man created by God does not admit distinction between black, white, yellow, olives, Chinese, Mongolian, Arab, Indian.

We are all of the human race living in a troubled world in which there are multiple questions and few answers.

Professor Shepard explains the great rout of Hispanic Judaism by an event that occurred in the town of Ayllón when a rabbi who must have been ill