Marranos: A Lost People

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Term Paper Title	Marranos: A Lost People
# of Words	2337
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	9.35

Marranos: A Lost People

Marranos: A Lost People

        Some people might call them New Jews, some New Christians, and others
call them Marranos. The majority of the world population has no idea who the
Marranos are. To begin to explain these secret people, one must first receive a
lesson in World History. We will begin in the 1492.
     In school, we are brainwashed to connect the year 1492 with the year
that Columbus discovered the New World. Yet, if we look at the year 1492, there
are other occurrences which are noteworthy. For instance, in the year 1492,
Spain, the country which sent Columbus to America, decided to officially expel
the Jews from Spain. The Jews were forced to either leave Spain, convert to
Catholicism, or be put to death.  This was not a surprise to the Jews of Spain.
Since 1931, there had been anti-Jewish riots throughout Spain. For years, the
Jews had been converting to Christianity to escape religious persecution. These
Jews were called conversos. The twist to this tale is that these conversos
actually were only putting on a front. They still considered themselves Jews.
They practiced in secret.1 The Spanish made every attempt to search out and
punish these conversos.  Some Jews chose not to convert and they moved to
Portugal. . Unfortunately, Portugal, in 1497, expelled the Jews from its borders
as well. Anti-semitism was growing in Western Europe and the Jews needed to
escape. The prime choice seemed to be so obvious. The Jews went to the New World.

     The immigration of the Marranos to the new world might have begun with
none other than Christopher Columbus. This, of course, is not definite, but
there has  been research which has shown that Columbus was indeed a Marrano.
Apparently his parents were Marranos.2 Even though there are some disagreements
about this fact, there is strong evidence to support the claim that Columbus was
Jewish.
        As the Marranos arrived in the New World, they were not able to reveal
their secret identities and practice as Jews. This was because the Spanish
government established inquisition offices in the New World. These office's sole
responsibility was to hunt down Marranos and bring them to justice. The
inquisitors had to visit every town once a year and gather evidence of "non-
believers" of the church. They would reward anyone who came forth with
information. The information could be days old or forty years old, it made no
difference to the Inquisitors. The punishments for being caught were vari...

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