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23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Free of Catholic rule, Conversos reJudaize in Amsterdam., June 24, 1999
By A Customer
In the last decade of the 16th and first decades of the 17th centuries, Spanish and Portuguese Conversos leave their homelands and come to Amsterdam seeking what author Miriam Bodian calls rejudaization, or what we, today, call conversion as a requirement for full participation in community life and benefits derived by being part of rabbinic Judaism. Affluent, educated, and willing to learn rabbinic Judaism, these Conversos are seeking to learn and to establish Jewish rituals and worship. For example, ex-Conversos seek religious aid from Uri Halevi, an Ashkenazi rabbi from Emden who establishs what is probably the first synagogue in Amsterdam in 1595. When Halevi starts circumcising Conversos, the Dutch authorities arrest him and charge him with circumcising adults who are presumably Conversos. However, Halevi is released and allowed to continue working with the Iberian ex-Conversos and with his help they are able to establish their own rituals by 1603. One of the early Conversos who arrives in Holland is Isaac Pinto. He is overjoyed at having been given the opportunity to practice Judaism, the religion of his Iberian ancestors. Pinto not only learns Judaism, he studies Hebrew and established a synagogue, which he finances in its entirety during his lifetime. Although few of the ex-Conversos have the financial means that Pinto had, they actively participate in the Jewish community life of Amsterdam. However, as the 17th century starts passing, a new type of Converso who views Judaism as a practical necessity begin arriving in Amsterdam. Often times, this group of Conversos wanted to participate in the life of the synagogue and receive the benefits derived from being part of the Jewish community, but had no desire to undergo circumcision. There are examples of uncircumcised Conversos who died in Amsterdam and their families wanted to bury them in the Jewish cemetery of Ouderkerk. The Mahamad (see definition) ruled that the dead Conversos had to be circumcised before they could be buried in Ouderkerk. "Denial of the right of burial [in the Jewish cemetery] was used by the Mahamad in Amsterdam, if not to encourage circumcision, to pressure a few of the émigrés to undergo formal conversion to Judaism. These were persons who unquestionably belonged to the `Nation' but, because of known female old Christian ancestors on their mother's side, were not Jewish according to rabbinical law, which held that Jewishness was transmitted through the mother". The Amsterdam Jewish community was very careful not to upset Spain or Portugal by actively promoting Judaism or openly protecting crypto-Jews on Spanish or Portuguese soil. This was because Amsterdam's ex-Conversos were heavily engaged in commerce as ship owners, diamond and spice traders, and many other activities related to commerce with the Spanish and Portuguese empires. Although the Amsterdam Jewish community probably did not openly help Crypto-Jews in Iberia, there is evidence that some of the many prayer books that were printed in Spanish and Portuguese in Amsterdam were sent to Spain and Portugal or their overseas possessions (Bodian page 199). The Amsterdam ex-Conversos strongly encouraged their friends and relatives in the Iberian Peninsula to leave before the Inquisition find them. The following exerts from letters written by the ex-Converso Abraham Idaña (Gaspar Mendez del Arroyo) to Conversos in Iberia illustrate the feelings of Amsterdam Jews in 1686: "The notion of serving God in one's heart, it is not enough. The law of Moses was given in order to be observed. It is a particularly grave sin to remain uncircumcised. One must flee to lands of freedom and be circumcised without delay. Nor should one delude oneself that good deeds can compensate for failure to observe the Law". The ex-Converso community in Amsterdam was always ready to help newly arrived Conversos who needed help to return to Judaism. If the community could not help the newly arrived Conversos in Amsterdam, the community would aid the new comers to find passage to the Ottoman empire, Italy, or even to the New World where more freedom could be found than in the Iberian Peninsula. Once the ex-Converso community established rabbinic Judaism they began observing Jewish precepts and prohibitions, developed over many centuries, which regulated and restricted relations between Jews and Gentiles. Regardless of this, there is evidence that some ex-Conversos men took lower-class gentile women, often maidservants, as mistresses. From 1600-1623, notarial records reveal instances of sexual relations between Portuguese Jews and gentile women (most of them were Dutch or Scandinavian). Even though it was illegal to have sexual relations between Jews and gentiles under Jewish and Dutch law, few of the ex-Conversos or their mistresses were prosecuted. Bodian tells us that to a degree the fathers of the illegitimate children provided for their support and that a group of fifteen Amsterdam Jewish merchants established a society called Dotar for the purpose of providing a dowry to orphans and poor girls descendants of the Portuguese Nation or Castilian Conversos. It is conceivable that many of the illegitimate daughters of ex-Conversos were eligible and obtained dowry to marry Jews. Eligibility to obtain a dowry was not only for Amsterdam's girls, but it was extended to girls who lived in the Iberian Peninsula, or other parts of Europe, the Ottoman empire, and the New World. Candidates had to prove eligibility by demonstrating that they were descendants of Conversos through either their paternal or maternal line. In order to find suitable candidates for dowries, the Amsterdam ex-Converso community established an elaborated network in many countries. It is possible that the dowry network extended its activity beyond determining eligibility for dowry. The Amsterdam ex-Converso community gained knowledge of rabbinic Judaism rapidly and by the 1630s they had produced their own rabbis and scholars, such as Menasseh ben Israel and Isaac Aboab da Fonseca. The community not only produced brilliant Jewish scholars but as a whole was very active in religious activity and its knowledge of Jewish traditions was adequate, if not brilliant (Bodian page 110). The ex-Converso community learned because of its perseverance to acieve rejudaization.
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6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Double Prize winner!, April 12, 1999
By A Customer
This book received the National Jewish Book Award (ceremony was in March 1999) from the Jewish Book Council for best achievement in Jewish History, as well as the Koret Foundation's $10,000 Koret Jewish Book Award for achievement in History (awarded April 1999)
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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The S &P phenomena is real..., September 2, 2007
This review is from: Hebrews of the Portuguese Nation: Conversos and Community in Early Modern Amsterdam (The Modern Jewish Experience) (Paperback)
Bodian is a scholar, that has weighed the options of the sellability of books vs. insight into history, in this well chronicled book. The difference between the two is that, history can tend to be on the dry side when sticking to facts and reality. Vs. the other which, capitalizes on hype, therefore, diminishing the overall thoroughness of the scholarship.
Bodian's insight into the phenomena of the Spanish and Portuguese Jewish conditions is right on. The Spanish and Portuguese Jews ( S&P Jews) are a particular substrata of Sephardim that suffered a unrelenting persecution from the Catholic Church, otherwise known as: El Santo Oficio de la Inqusicion, The Spanish Inquisition.
Many have tried to put this phenomena, The Jewishness of Crypto-Jews into perspective. Not only is it difficult, on a scholarly level,i.e., to provide a understanding to this aberration of Judaic history. But, the very phenomena of this tragedy, is stained with frustration. On behalf of the mainstream Jewish populace, when addressing the religious status of these isolated people.( I believe that their are political power issues at hand) And the Returness themselves, who want to be accounted as fully Jewish, and rightly so!
Yes, their are provisions made in Judaism for Anusim (forced ones). However, doubt always lingers when people come out from nowhere ( so it seems), and declares...I am Jewish. When, in all sincerity, they all but diapered from the radar of Rabbinical Judaism (in the eyes of some of the Rabbis). But in fact, they have in their hearts been living under religiously oppressive realities, trying to keep the flame of their Jewish souls intact, by whatever means possible. The S&P Jews, have always had to suffer with this stigma. This stigma, lends itself to have to prove one's worthiness( being Jewish) and personhood(dignity) within Jewish circles. This happened then and it happens now. This religious radar, is not the barometer, that constitutes, who is a Jew and who is not a Jew. The barometer is the halacha which lends itself useful to all Anusim irregardless of circumstances or time.
If you follow the literature of today, in regards to this very issue, there are many examples that might sway one to believe that the S&P phenomena is a tragedy of the past. This is not to so, but, in fact the contrary is true. The provisions that are given in the halacha regarding Anusim, are there not only to prove present events, but to guarantee the future ones too, irregardless of their geographical location or time.
Although, Bodian never tampers with this volatile halachic subject, she does present the Ba'alim teshuvah (returnees to G-D's commandments) as suffering internal as well as external pressures given all the difficulties presented in separation from mainstream or rabbinic Judaism. These difficulties are expressed here in Bodain's book very well. It is presented in as, a matter of fact, manner as possible. Which lends itself ultimately, as more credible, rather than the normal patronising, that most scholars tend to gravitate too.
In all, this book is without a doubt a scholarly look at a very fragmented, but integral part of Judaism that needs to be understood rather than dismissed. I recommend it wholeheartedly.
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