Touching Story of a Crypto-Jewess converting to Judaism

[muman613]

AsheDina, I was thinking about you when I saw this article...

Everyone should read this for a lesson

http://www.aish.com/sp/so/51733547.html


My Converso Family

The first time I saw a Jew was one Saturday as we were driving to see my paternal grandparents. We saw several men with black hats, black coats, and beards walking in the streets of my grandfather's neighborhood. "Who are these men?" I asked my father. "They're Jews." He then mentioned that my grandfather's house was in the Jewish community. I always felt apprehensive around my paternal grandparents. There were very old and strict, especially my grandfather, who jut sat in his "special" chair where no one else was allowed to sit. My sisters and I were not allowed to get up from the couch and run around like normal kids.

    "What do you mean our family is Jewish? I have never heard of this!"

One day I asked my Aunt Sarah who lived with my grandparents, if she knew their house was located in a Jewish Community. Her answer changed my life forever. She said in a whisper, making sure my grandfather would not hear, "Of course I know our home is in a Jewish community. After all, our family is of Jewish origin. Our last name had been changed from Peres to Perez."

I could not believe my ears. "What do you mean our family is Jewish? What are you talking about? I have never heard of this!"

She told me that the family had come from Spain a few hundred years after the Spanish Inquisition and settled in Venezuela. They changed their name to blend in and avoid persecution. "You mean you never wondered why all of our names are Jewish names?"

I had to sit down to recover. Hundreds of images and situations flashed in front of my eyes. All the strange things my father's family did were not idiosyncrasies; they were mere family traditions dating back to the time of the Inquisition. I had found the lost piece of the puzzle. I was closer to the truth than I had ever been. I had a reason to embrace the fascinating religion with which I had become obsessed. I was going in the direction of truth. After all my family was Jewish, or was it?

I immediately started researching and reading about the Inquisition. I learned that the Jews in Spain had been tremendously affluent and relatively accepted in the early years, under the Muslim rulers-early 10th century, but suffered during persecutions by Iberian Christians such as the pogroms in Cordoba (1011) and Granada (1066). These attacks continued as the "Reconquista" took full blow, and by the 14th century the Christians had taken most of Spain from the Muslims. Many Jews decided to escape these attacks by converting to Catholicism. These Jews were the most affluent and did not want to give up their social and commercial status. They were called "conversos."

Many of these conversos practiced Judaism in hiding, pretending to be Catholics on the outside. They lived side-by-side with their Jewish brethren and some even remained active in the Jewish communities. At first this solution proved beneficial and many conversos became very successful. But inevitably, this very success sprouted jealousy within Catholic Spaniards who reported unfaithful conversos to the authorities. At the time many conversos practiced several Jewish customs that, for the Catholics, were definite signs that these people were not true converts and were still spiritually linked to their Jewish past. These conversos were then called marranos (pig in Spanish), or crypto-Jews, and were to become the main focus of the Inquisition's agenda.