Not much is known about the identity of Pero Roiz Soares. In all likelihood the author wrote his memoirs—which cover the period between 1565 and 1628—under a pseudonym. This is not surprising, since the volume is highly political and does not shy away from critiquing the governing authorities of his time, including past and present kings.*

*Jorge Peixoto, “Aspectos do ‘Memorial’ (1565-1628) de Pero Roiz Soares” [Aspects of Pero Roiz Soares’s “Memorial” (1565-1628)], Revista de História 7, no. 15 (1953): 393–395.

A Pardon of a Different Kind

by Nathalie Alyon

More than a century after the 1497 forced conversion of Portuguese Jews, the true faith of the New Christians, or conversos, continued to be questioned by inquisitorial offices and the general public. Perceived as members of a specific nation (homens da nação, or “men of the nation”), they faced discriminatory measures, and accusations of heresy were not uncommon. Despite these hurdles in integrating into the Lusitanian Old Christian community, conversos managed not only to establish strong financial networks within and without the Iberian Peninsula but also to use their economic and communal networks to obtain political gains vis-à-vis the Crown.

One of the ways the converso community’s political power manifested is revealed through the various negotiations for a general pardon that their leaders conducted with the Iberian monarchies over a period of 150 years.¹ Granted by the pope, general pardons aimed to erase crimes of heresy attributed to New Christians, suspending penalties imposed by the Inquisition, which at times included the freeing of prisoners, and the lifting of bans on travel or trade in exchange for large sums of money. Seen as concessions to a questionable community frequently accused of being heretical “Judaizers” and socioeconomic parvenus, such pardons were scarcely popular.

One particular general pardon—that of 1605, during the reign of Habsburg King Philip II of Portugal (Philip III of Spain)—roused significant opposition and is the topic of the following satirical poem, “Dialogue between the Hermit and Anton,” found in Memorial de Pero Roiz Soares (Memoirs of Pero Roiz Soares).² Written in an archaic, hybrid form of Spanish and Portuguese, the dialogue provides a glimpse of the contemporary popular reactions to the pardon.

Not much is known about the identity of Pero Roiz Soares. In all likelihood the author wrote his memoirs—which cover the period between 1565 and 1628—under a pseudonym. This is not surprising, since the volume is highly political and does not shy away from critiquing the governing authorities of his time, including past and present kings.³

During the period leading up to the 1605 general pardon, the monarchy was in dire need of cash, in part to secure its trade route to India. Previous concessions to the conversos—such as the right to leave the country—had been obtained in exchange for pecuniary “services” to the Crown before King Philip II turned to Pope Clement IV to enact the pardon in 1604, despite strong opposition from Portugal’s official clergy and the general public.⁴ In return for amnesty from the Inquisition, the New Christians paid a sum of 1,700,000 cruzados, collected from all Portuguese conversos as a mandatory proportional tax, the finta do perdão. Different expressions of hostility broke out in Coimbra, as prisoners were freed despite violent protests and hostility.⁵

Attacking the converso community served as a legitimate channel through which the people of the time could voice criticism against their rulers. Even though this satirical poem might be read primarily as an attack on the New Christians, Soares’s critique barely elaborates on the crimes of those whose “clothing is Christian, but the bodies underneath are Jewish.”⁶ He is not interested in entering a debate on whether or not the Inquisition was acting against sincere Catholics, as the conversos claimed. Rather, evoking the archetypal image of Judas Iscariot, he focuses on the hypocrisy of the political and religious establishment in pardoning the conversos, emphasizing the corruption of those involved in the pardon negotiations—namely, King Phillip II and the Duke of Lerma, the king’s minister.

As this document also reveals, the debate over the true faith and identity of the New Christians of Portugal was as much a question of political and economic considerations as it was a question of religion.⁷ Questioning the logic that could render possible the idea of forgiving religious sins in exchange for temporal gifts, Soares finds it absurd that politics dictate religious doctrine.

Indeed, he finds the crimes of those Christians that grant pardon for sins not atoned even greater than those of common criminals:

There is no reason that among us

we name the worse sinner

the one who sins against man

than the one who sins against God.⁸

The 1605 general pardon and the reactions it instigated also reveal the political and logistical power of the New Christian leadership—an aspect often overlooked in the historiography of this group. This translation complements this issue of JLS by positing the “real” identity of the conversos as a political rather than a religious issue.

Reveling in the political nature of an ancient general pardon demands the mention of a different kind of “pardon” that is taking place with respect to the descendants of Iberian Jews today in the twenty-first century—this time, from the Iberian democratic governments as part of a conscious policy of memory reconciliation. In 2015, Spain and Portugal ratified bills to grant citizenship to the descendants of Iberian Jews who were forced to flee the peninsula centuries before. Since then, thousands of Sephardi Jews have applied for citizenship, particularly to Portugal, where the bureaucratic process is simpler than in Spain.⁹

While some see this move as a call for historical repentance to right an ancient wrong, others view it as a political move to attract desirable immigration and foreign capital to countries facing economic problems. The expulsion had created two sets of victims: the conversos and those who fled their homes in order to continue to be Jews. The converso leaders who negotiated for the general pardons did not and could not ask to return to Judaism; rather, they petitioned to become fully integrated into the Christian community as Portuguese Catholics and were, in a sense, “pardoned.” Many among the “men of the nation” were indeed committed Christians. For those who fled and remained Jews, a different kind of pardon has arrived five hundred years later.

Nathalie Alyon

Notes

1 Claude B. Stuczynski, “New Christian Political Leadership in Times of Crisis: The Pardon Negotiations of 1605,” in Leadership in Times of Crisis, ed. Moisés Orfali, Bar-Ilan Studies in History 5 (Ramat Gan, Israel: Bar-Ilan University Press, 2004), 48.

2 Pero Roiz Soares, Memorial de Pero Roiz Soares, ed. M. Lopes de Almeida (Coimbra, Portugal: Acta Universitatis Conimbrigensis, 1953), 393–395.

3 Jorge Peixoto, “Aspectos do ‘Memorial’ (1565-1628) de Pero Roiz Soares” [Aspects of Pero Roiz Soares’s “Memorial” (1565-1628)], Revista de História 7, no. 15 (1953): 393–395.

4 Stuczynski, “New Christian Political Leadership in Times of Crisis,” 56.

5 J. I. Pulido Serrano, “Perdoni Generali” [General pardons], in Dizionario storico dell’Inquisizione [Historical dictionary of the Inquisition], vol. 3, ed. Adriano Prosperi (Pisa: Scuola Normale Superiore, 2010), 1190; Stuczynski, “New Christian Political Leadership in Times of Crisis,” 49.

6 Soares, Memorial, 393.

7 Stuart B. Schwartz, All Can Be Saved: Religious Tolerance and Salvation in the Iberian Atlantic World (New Haven, CT: Yale University, 2008), 101.

8 Soares, Memorial, 394–395.

9 To obtain Spanish citizenship, applicants are required, in addition to proving their Sephardi ancestry, to pass two examinations: one in Spanish language proficiency and another attesting to “the knowledge of the Spanish Constitution and the social and cultural reality of Spain.” Portugal requires no language or citizenship exams. See “Bill Granting the Spanish Citizenship to Sephardic Jews with Spanish Origins,” accessed August 15, 2016, http://www.exteriores.gob.es/Consulados/JERUSALEN/es/Documents/BILL%20GRANTING%20SPANISH%20CITIZENSHIP%20TO%20SEPHARDIC%20JEWS%20%20Jerusalem.pdf; and “Sephardic Jews Citizenship Law Office Portugal,” accessed August 15, 2016, http://www.sephardicjewsportugal.com/.