The history of Portuguese Jews reaches back over two thousand years and is directly related to Sephardi history, a Jewish ethnic division that represents communities that originated in the Iberian Peninsula (Portugal and Spain). In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Portuguese Jews emigrated to a number of European cities outside Portugal, where they established new Portuguese Jewish communities, including in Hamburg, Antwerp, and the Netherlands,Bodian, Miriam (1997) Hebrews of the Portuguese Nation: Conversos and Community in Early Modern Amsterdam. Bloomington: Indiana University PressSwetschinski, Daniel M. (2000) Reluctant Cosmopolitans: The Portuguese Jews of Seventeenth-Century Amsterdam. London: Littman Library of Jewish Civilization which remained connected culturally and economically, in an international commercial network during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
Before Portugal
Jewish populations existed in Iberia long before Portugal became a separate kingdom, dating to the Roman era (province of Lusitania), but an attested Jewish presence in Portuguese territory can be documented only since 482 CE.Jorge Martins (2006), Portugal e os Judeus: Volume I – dos primórdios da nacionalidade à legislação pombalina, Lisboa, Vega. Two Sephardic Jewish families, Rodriguez and Gradis, are traditionally said to have emigrated from Judaea to Iberia following the Bar Kokhba revolt, settling first in Portugal and later moving to Spain.
In 711 CE, the Islamic invasion of the Iberian Peninsula was seen by many in the Jewish population as a liberation, and marked as the beginning of what many have seen as a golden age (the Islamic Al-Andalus) even if the Jews, as well as the Christians (the Mozarabs of the Visigothic rite), under Muslim rule were considered dhimmi, who paid a special tax as non-Muslims but could openly practice their religion and live in autonomous communities.
Rapidly in the 8th century, the Christian kingdoms of the north mountainous areas of the Iberian Peninsula (Kingdom of Asturias) started a centuries' long military campaign against the Muslim invaders, the Christian reconquest. The Jews, since many of them knew Arabic, were used by the Christians as both spies and diplomats on the campaign. That granted them some respect although there was always prejudice. Major changes came to Jews in Portugal following the fall of the last Islamic kingdom of Granada to the Catholic Monarchs in 1492.
History
Medieval Era Christian Portugal achieved victory over the Muslims in the Reconquest of the peninsula, with King Afonso I of Portugal becoming monarch of the newly independent region. Afonso entrusted Yahia Ben Yahi III with the post of supervisor of tax collection and nominated him the first Chief-Rabbi of Portugal (a position always appointed by the King of Portugal). Jewish communities had been established prior to these years, an example of Jewish expansion can be seen in the town of Leiria founded by King Afonso I in 1135.Lay 2009 p.147 The importance of the Jewish population to the development of the urban economy can be inferred from charters Afonso granted in 1170 to the non-Christian merchants living in Lisbon, Almada, Palmela and Alcacer.Lay 2009 p.148 These charters guaranteed the Jewish minorities in the towns freedom of worship and the use of traditional law-codes. King Sancho I continued to honor these charters by protecting the Jewish community from rioting crusaders in 1189 by forcibly removing them from Lisbon.Lay 2009 p.159 The importance of the Jewish community in the economy of Portugal can be inferred from the punishment against those who robbed merchant men, robbing either Muslim, Christian, and Jew was of equal severity. King Sancho I of Portugal continued his father's policy, making Jose Ibn-Yahya, the son of Yahia Ben Rabbi, High Steward of the Realm. The clergy, however, invoking the restrictions of the Fourth Council of the Lateran, brought considerable pressure to bear against the Jews during the reign of King Dinis I of Portugal, but the monarch maintained a conciliatory position.
The Faro Pentateuch, printed in 1487, was the first printed book published in Portugal. It was printed in Hebrew, and published by a Jew, Samuel Gacon, who had fled from the Spanish Inquisition.
Until the 15th century, some Jews occupied prominent places in Portuguese political and economic life. For example, Isaac Abrabanel was the treasurer of King Afonso V of Portugal. Many also had an active role in the Portuguese culture, and they kept their reputation of diplomats and merchants. By this time, Lisbon and Évora were home to important Jewish communities.
After the January 1492 fall of the last Islamic kingdom of Granada, the Catholic Monarchs of Spain issued a decree in March 1492, forcing Jews in Spain to either convert immediately to Christianity or leave Spain. Many fled to the kingdom of Portugal, whose monarch was more tolerant of a Jewish presence there. Portugal was the destination of most Jews who chose to leave Spain after their expulsion in 1492. Around 100,000 Spanish Jews decided to move to the neighboring Kingdom of Portugal, where a minor Jewish population already was residing.Livermore 1973 p.86
The Portuguese were reluctant to admit the Jews into Portugal, but John II proposed to collect a tax of eight cruzados per person. Metal-workers and armorers would pay half.Livermore 1972 p.86 Officials were appointed to collect the tax at five points, issuing receipts which served as passports to enter Portugal. After eight months, the Portuguese crown would provide transport elsewhere at an additional fee. Six hundred wealthy families were offered a special contract to remain in Portugal and were settled in the larger cities. Those who could not afford the fee demanded from them by King John II after those eight months were declared his enslaved personal property and distributed to the Portuguese nobility. However, the Portuguese were not willing to house the large remaining population of Jewish immigrants. In some cases, Jewish families were housed within Christian households; in the city of Évora, the authorities refused to let in more Jewish families. King John II attempted to facilitate the transportation of Jewish families to other kingdoms.When Manuel I of Portugal married a daughter of the Spanish rulers, he was pressed to align his policies with theirs.Pulido Serrano, Juan Ignacio p.42 In December 1496, King Manuel I decreed that all Jews and Muslims in Portugal had until October 1497 to either be baptized or leave the country. In this way, many Jews were expelled, while others were integrated into Portuguese society.Pulido Serrano, Juan Ignacio 2003 p.42
Portuguese overseas voyages Scientific developments by Portuguese Jews made a direct contribution to Portugal's age of exploration. In 1497, Vasco da Gama took Abraham Zacuto's tables and the astrolabe with him on the maiden trip to India.Although it took a little time to adapt. João de Barros (1552) Decadas de Asia Dec. 1.2, p.280-81, relates how Vasco da Gama, arriving at the Bay of St. Helen in November 1497, disembarked to take the readings because he did not quite trust the new-fangled astrolabe on board. Physician-astronomer Master João Faras, aboard the fleet of Pedro Álvares Cabral, upon landing in Brazil in 1500, also complains about the astrolabe readings at sea. But pilot João de Lisboa (writing c. 1514) indicates the use of astrolabe and tables were already perfected and routine. See Albuquerque, Luís de, "Introdução", in 1986 ed. of Abraão Zacuto, Almanach Perpetuum, Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional Casa da Moeda The astrolabe would continue to be used by Portuguese ships thereafter to reach far destinations such as Brazil and India.
Zacuto might have an uncredited appearance in Luís de Camões's 1572 epic poem, The Lusiad, as the unnamed "old man of Restelo beach", a Cassandra-like character that surges forward just before Vasco da Gama's departure to chide the vanity of fame and warn of the travails that await him (Canto IV, v.94-111). This may be Camões' poetic interpretation of an alleged meeting (reported in Gaspar Correia) between Vasco da Gama and the older Abraham Zacuto at a monastery by Belém beach, just before his fleet's departure, in which Zacuto reportedly gave Gama some final navigational tips and warned him of dangers to avoid.Gaspar Correia (c. 1550s) Lendas da India, (p.23)
The so-called Amazonian Jews did not arrive in Brazil during the colonial era, but rather are descended from Moroccan Jews who immigrated to the Amazon region during the Amazon rubber boom.
Inquisition, persecutions and expulsions
Spain instituted the Spanish Inquisition in 1478 before decreeing the expulsion of all Jews from Spain in 1492. Tens of thousands of Spanish Jews fled Spain, including to Portugal, where King John II granted them asylum in return for payment. However, the asylum was withdrawn after eight months, with the Portuguese government decreeing the enslavement of all Jews who had not left Portugal. In 1493, King John deported several hundred Jewish children to the newly formed colony of São Tomé, where many of them perished.
King John died in 1495, and the new king Manuel I of Portugal at first restored the freedom of the Jews. However, in 1496, under Spanish pressure as part of the marriage of Isabella, Princess of Asturias, the Church, and some Christians among the Portuguese people, King Manuel decreed that all Jews had to convert to Christianity or leave the country without their children by October 1497. The initial edict of expulsion of 1496 was then turned into an edict of forced conversion in 1497, whereby Portuguese Jews were prevented from leaving the country and were forcibly baptized and converted to Christianity. Hard times followed for the Portuguese Jews, with the massacre of 2000 conversos in Lisbon in 1506, further forced deportations to São Tomé (where there is still a Jewish presence today), and the relatively late establishment of the Portuguese Inquisition in 1536.
In 1525, David Reubeni, a Jewish man who claimed to be the commander of a Jewish army in the Ottoman Empire, arrived in Portugal. With the approval of the Pope, he sought the Portuguese king's assistance in providing him with ammunition to fight against the Muslims. Reubeni stayed in Portugal for several months, during which he sparked messianic expectations among the New Christians. His actions also led to the conversion of Solomon Molcho, which ultimately resulted to the King of Portugal expelling Reubeni from the country.
Jews in Portugal were forced to convert to Christianity, but were largely allowed to practice their religion in private. Portugal did not immediately establish an Inquisition until 1536. The Inquisition held its first Auto da fé in Portugal in 1540. Like the Spanish Inquisition, it concentrated its efforts on rooting out converts from other faiths (overwhelmingly Judaism) who did not adhere to the strictures of Catholic orthodoxy; like in Spain, the Portuguese inquisitors mostly targeted the Jewish New Christians, conversos, or marranos. The Portuguese Inquisition expanded its scope of operations from Portugal to the Portuguese Empire, including Brazil, Cape Verde, and India. According to Henry Charles LeaHenry Charles Lea, A History of the Inquisition of Spain, vol. 3, Book 8. between 1540 and 1794 tribunals in Lisbon, Porto, Coimbra and Évora burned 1,175 persons, another 633 were burned in effigy and 29,590 were penanced. The Portuguese Inquisition was extinguished in 1821 by the "General Extraordinary and Constituent Courts of the Portuguese Nation".