Jews in the tribunals of the Spanish Inquisition

The Spanish Inquisition was established in 1478 by the Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella, with papal authorization, principally to monitor the religious sincerity of the Conversos, those Jews converted to Christianity who were suspected of continuing to practice Judaism in secret. Unlike Jews who remained openly in their faith (expelled in 1492), the Conversos fell under the jurisdiction of the Church as baptized Christians. The Inquisition put in place an elaborate system of denunciations, inquiries, interrogations under torture, and trials, whose public culmination could be the auto-da-fé (act of faith), at which the condemned were either reconciled or handed over to the secular arm to be burned. As its first Grand Inquisitor, Tomás de Torquemada gave the institution its formidable organization. Extended to the American colonies and to Portugal, the Inquisition pursued its activity against "Judaizers" for several centuries and was not definitively abolished until the nineteenth century, leaving a lasting imprint on Sephardic Memory.

Sources & resources

• Encyclopaedia Judaica — 2e éd., Keter/Macmillan
• Jewish Virtual Library ↗