The Spanish Inquisition and the Converso Challenge (C

Chapter 6 The Spanish Inquisition and the Converso Challenge (c. 1480–1525): A Question of Race, Religion or Socio-political Ascendancy? Helen Rawlings 1 Introduction The Spanish Inquisition, established by papal bull on 1 November 1478, was originally set up to deal with a specific group of individuals known as conversos – Jews who had converted to Christianity either voluntarily or un- der duress in the wake of rising anti-Semitic tensions in society and who were commonly regarded as being insincere in their new faith and reverting back to their former one. At the beginning of the reign of Ferdinand and Isa- bel (1469–1516), backsliding Jews were deemed to represent a major potential threat to the stability of the new Catholic state, recently emerged from the long years of struggle against Islam, and eager to assert its dominance as both a political and religious force. So great was the monarchs’ concern, that a spe- cial institution – the Holy Office of the Inquisition – was founded to root out the incidence of heresy within the crypto-Jewish community of Spain. At the same time, this unprecedented measure served to consolidate the Crown’s control over its disparate kingdoms via a common faith. The brutal persecution of converso heresy, concentrated over the next five decades (c. 1480–1525), was set to continue – against all expectations – at intermittent intervals over the following three centuries. It set an indelible stamp of infamy on the history and reputation of the Spanish Inquisition that became embodied in the Black Legend – a stereotypical image of Spain as a repressive, intolerant na- tion, propagated by its Protestant enemies, which modern historiography has largely reduced to a myth. In examining the historical record of the Inquisition we have to be mind- ful of its polemical status and the impact this has had on judgements of its past. This is particularly so in relation to its persecution of conversos which has arguably aroused most controversy. Until the mid-20th century opinion was colored more by the ideological and political persuasion of writers than by objective analysis. Juan Antonio Llorente (1756–1823), a former inquisitor- turned-liberal, who wrote the first critical history of the Inquisition from exile © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ��9 | doi:�0.��63/9789004393875_008 <UN> 176 Rawlings in France in 1817, argued that the Holy Office actively encouraged religious hy- pocrisy among Jewish converts by its failure to provide for their full instruction into the Catholic faith.1 Marcelino Menéndez Pelayo (1856–1912), the vanguard of conservative scholarship in late 19th-century Spain, controversially held the Jews to be responsible for entering into conflict with their converso descen- dants on account of their perfidy, and it was this, he claimed, that fractured inter-faith relations in Spanish society, rather than the Inquisition itself that acted in response.2 Meanwhile Protestant historians such as the American William Prescott (1796–1859) attributed Spain’s decline in the 17th century to the Inquisition’s persecution of the conversos and the Crown’s expulsion of the Jews, actions which he argued stripped it of its economic potential and were underpinned by religious bigotry and political despotism.3 At the beginning of the 20th century, Henry Charles Lea (1825–1909) became the first histori- an to make systematic use of archival evidence to inform his history of the Spanish Inquisition.4 Although critical of its anti-Semitic agenda, he also ac- knowledged that the Holy Office had been established for reasons that were seen as legitimate in their time and advised caution in evaluating its reputation. While historical debate in Spain remained stifled during the long Franco dictatorship, scholars from the English-speaking world, including pioneering figures such as Henry Kamen, followed Lea’s initiative and began to examine the Inquisition’s records with closer scrutiny and articulate a more objective, analytical approach to its legacy. The end of the Franco regime in 1975 marked a further major turning point in inquisitorial studies. The full opening up of Spanish archives and the de-politicization of historical discourse allowed for a new generation of Spanish, as well as international scholars to re-examine many of the controversies surrounding the practices of the Inquisition from broader, dispassionate perspectives.5 Later 20th-century historians have raised a number of fundamental ques- tions regarding the justification for the Inquisition’s activity in relation to its converso victims – the particular focus of this study. Were the conversos se- cret Jews and therefore rightful targets of the Inquisition, or were they faithful 1 Juan Antonio Llorente, Historia crítica de la Inquisición Española, vol. 1 (Madrid: 1980 [1st ed.1870]), x. 2 Marcelino Menéndez Pelayo, Historia de los heterodoxos españoles, vol. 1 (Madrid: 1880), 625–39. 3 William Hickling Prescott, History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, vol. 1 (London: 1837), 518–22. 4 Henry Charles Lea, History of the Inquisition of Spain, 4 vols. (London and New York: 1906–07). 5 For contemporary trends in inquisitorial historiography, see Francisco Bethencourt, The In- quisition. A Global History, 1478–1834 (Cambridge: 2009), 16–27. <UN>.

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