your king Herod considered with himself, and assembled the wise men of his city, and asked where the Infant should be born, for whom the magi were enquiring, and they answered him, In Bethlehem of Judæa, according to the prophecy of Micah de Perginó, and that those magi declared that they had been led from afar to the Holy Land by a star of exceeding brightness. Consider whether it be not the fulfilment of this prophecy, Kings shall sing and walk in the brightness of His birth. Take heed, moreover, that ye do not persecute Him whom ye are bound to honour highly and to receive with good will, but be well advised. We tell you that we cannot, either by counsel or will, consent to His death, for were we to do so, then to us would the prophecy apply, which saith, They shall assemble with one consent against the Lord and against His Messiah. And we advise you, wise though ye be, that, in so weighty a matter as this, ye proceed with caution, lest the God of Israel, in His wrath with you, should destroy the second house of your second temple; for be ye well assured that it will soon be destroyed, and this was the reason why our ancestors who came out of the captivity in Babylon (under the guidance of Pyrrhus their captain, who was sent by king Cyrus, and who brought them out with great riches which he carried away from Babylon, in the sixty-ninth year of the captivity, and they received protection from the pagans of Toledo), built a large Aljama, and would not return again

to Jerusalem.-Toledo, fourteenth day of the month Nisan; era of Cesar, eighteen, and of Augustus Octavianus, seventy-one."

9917

The following are the grounds on which I support my opinion that this letter is an entire fiction, namely, on the fact that at the time of Jesus Christ's death there were no Jews living in Spain; on the improbability and absurdity of the supposition that the Jews of Jerusalem should hold a conference with their brethren who were scattered throughout the world; and lastly, on the assertion of all who believe in the genuineness of the document, that it was translated into Spanish at the time when Toledo was conquered by Alfonso the Sixth, for in this age all documents were written in Latin. In addition to this, the translation of this document is written in a barbarous language, a confused medley of ancient and modern Castilian, with a smattering of Portuguese and Gallician.18

There cannot be the slightest doubt that this letter originated in the desire to make the Jews appear less odious than they were in the eyes of the people and even of the nobility, and the wish to mitigate the cruel persecutions they suffered in modern times by the tri

17 This letter is published by Sandoval in his Historia de los Reyes, &c. (see reign of Alonso the Sixth), but he says that he does not know what amount of credit to attach to it.-Translator.

18 Let those who wish to have their ears tickled with the sound of this beautiful jargon, go to Vigo or Tuy, both of them towns in Gallicia, for a few days, and they will have a fine opportunity of putting the delicacy of their auricular organs to the test. I speak from experience.-Translator.

bunal of the Holy Office. I formed this opinion after reading the accounts of several authors who assert that the descendants of those Jews of the synagogue of Toledo who raised their voices against the execution of Jesus Christ, deserved to be rewarded and esteemed as good men.

Father Juan de Pineda, in his Monarquía Eclesiástica, writes as follows: "The Jews who lived at Toledo were not at Jerusalem at the time of our Redeemer's passion, nor did they consent to it. Such being the case, they may boast of the highest lineage in the world; for nobility of blood depends on the personal excellence of parentage, as well as on privileges and honours conferred by princes. And the founders of the house of Israel, to wit, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, were very eminent men and more highly honoured by God than any who have been born into the world. Therefore, as many persons of Jewish descent as shall prove that their ancestors in no wise consented to the Redeemer's death (on the score of which they forfeited their nobility (hidalguia)), and believed in Him, like Nicodemus, Gamaliel, and some others, must, without question, equally with those ancestors, be of the highest lineage in the world."

9919

Father Quintana Dueñas, in his Singularia, a posthumous work, launches out still further in his account of the merits of all that proved descent from the Jews

19 Francisco de Padilla, in his Historia Eclesiástica, vol. 1. fol. 2, speaks of Pineda and refers to this passage, of which he quotes the substance, though not the exact words.- Translator,

who opposed the death of Jesus; for he says they ought to be honoured with admission to the military orders, and be preferred to ecclesiastical dignities. As his words are very quaint, I give a translation of them from their original Latin:20 "I shall not forbear to remark that if any one shall prove his descent from that family of the Hebrews which in no wise consented to Christ's death, and it shall appear that the said family did oppose it, and after the publication of the law of grace did not relapse to Judaism, he may be admitted to ecclesiastical orders and dignities, and not only religious, but military ones, even though by the statutes of both, persons of Hebrew extraction are excluded from admission to them."

There is nothing extraordinary in the supposition that after the Jews were expelled from Spain, those who reluctantly received baptism and remained under the disguise of Christians, on seeing the contempt in which such were holden as were descended from the converts, should forge this document and should spread these notices to exalt their pedigree, by thus flattering the affections of the vulgar, the learned, and even their very persecutors and enemies.

20 Singularia moralis Theologiæ ad quinque præcepta ecclesiæ necnon ad ecclesiasticas censuras et pœnas; opus posthumum.

Madrid, 1652.

Tandem non desinam hic adnotare quod si aliquis probaret se ex ea Hebræorum familia descendere quæ nullo modo morti Christi assensum præbuisset, immo et contradixisse constaret, nec etiam post promulgatam gratiæ legem in Judaismum incidisset, posset quidem admitti ad ordines ac dignitates ecclesiasticas, necnon ad religiones quascunque etiam militares, quantumvis illæ à suo gremio expelli omnes ex sanguine Hebræorum procreatos statuerint.

The words of these authors prove the weakness and blindness of human reason, and its readiness to twist and turn the tempers of mortals in such a manner as to make them hate what they most love, and love what they most abhor. For, as men's opinions are almost always swayed by the force of passions, they experience more changes than the sea or the moon; and as they dash to the ground whatever accords not exactly with their own sentiments, so do they praise up to the skies whatever agrees with their natural disposition and temper. Thus they who once abhorred all that observed the law of Moses and refused the descendants of the latter admission to ecclesiastical dignities and military orders, would now throw the door wide open to them, owing to a mere fiction that was pleasing in their eyes. Such is the effect of a notice which carries with it the appearance of truth, and has the good fortune to obtain credit with persons of illustrious birth, established fame, and eminence in the literary world!

By means of the credit given [by such persons] to the letter which stated that the Spanish Hebrews, and particularly those of the kingdom of Toledo, though earnestly solicited by their brethren of Jerusalem, refused to lend their vote and consent to Christ's death, other lies were invented which met with an equally favourable reception. One of these was the assertion that, in the year 33, the Jews sent to Jerusalem two messengers, named Athanasius and Joseph, to make a verbal protest in the name of the Toledan and all other Jews in Spain, with the intent to obstruct the