I just heard this, apparantly the guy who told me reckons theres some merit to it, he himself even claimed to be a Jew in private to a few people and in a few writings…
Whats the straight dope?
It’s almost certainly a myth, brought about by the fact that 1492 is the year of both the expulsion of the Jews from Spain and of Columbus’ voyage, the theory being that the Jews were being expelled, so he left too. The first problem with this is that Columbus wasn’t Spanish - he’d travelled there in his effort to get funding for his trip westward, but he was a native of Genoa (a state in modern-day Italy), and had travelled widely. If he was a secret Jew, he would presumably have been able to just go home. I’ve heard a whole set of ways to poke holes in this whole idea, but as I don’t have a cite, I’ll leave it at the one fact that I’m quite sure of.
For: Was Christopher Columbus Jewish? Why is it so hard to tell?
The extensive “against” article correctly points out that lots of groups wanted a piece of Columbus after the fact, and the “Jewish” Columbus is but one among many.
Whether or not Columbus was Jewish, it is known that members of his crew were, and that many of the original ‘Conquistadors’ who explored the New World were converted Jews, or Conversos (who converted but practiced in secret.)
Jews were well-integrated into Spain and huge numbers of them hid their identities. More Spanish people and people of Hispanic descent have Jewish ancestry than you could imagine (even Carlos Santana supposdly has some.)
A great site about this issue and hundreds of other celebrities and Judaism is www.jewhoo.com. An entry on Columbus is in there, as are many other interesting people.
Definitely not a new rumor. My Hebrew School teacher gave us this one. I thought it was nonsense then, and do now. And the rumor certainly includes that Columbus was Italian.
I heard Chrisopher Columbus was gay.
[insert appropriate smiley]
Everyone knows that Columbus was a single mother trying to balance a family with a career.
It sounds to me like you’re saying that the Conversos mostly continued with their faith, only acting out the rituals of Catholicism. Now, I have no doubt that this happened, but was it really that frequent? How many generations did their faith survive under such difficult circumstances? My (limited) grasp of Spanish history (gleaned from literature classes, not actual study of history) has left me with the impression that most of the Conversos really did convert to Christianity.
The amount of evidence needed to decide a convert was reverting to Islam or Judaism was pretty small. Many people for example were accused because they didn’t eat pork - there is obviously no requirement for Christians to eat it, but not doing so was considered a sign that the person was secretly still a Jew or a Muslim. Or converts might be accused because they associated with Jews or Muslims - or even other former Jews or Muslims. Or converts might be accused because of the way they dressed or talked or made gestures. In other words, they may have converted to Christianity but they were still acting “different”. Obviously many of these people were probably genuine converts who were just following old habits that had nothing to do with their religious beliefs.
This was done via DNA analysis, but the results haven’t been published in a scientific journal yet so the scientific community is very skeptical.
There’s a Portuguese dish that contains pork and clams, Carne de Porco a Alentejana. At least one source says this dish was used to expose converted Jews because it contained two ingredients that Jews would not eat if they hadn’t converted to Christianity in true faith.
Beyond that, the results that have been published simply state that portions of both the male and female derived DNA is compatible with Jewish ancestry. If something is compatible with something else, it hardly makes the case that the DNA was not also compatible with other ethnic backgrounds. Aside from rank curiosity, I cannot perceive the reason to conduct the examination.
Looks like Jewornotjew.com has already updated his profile to account for the new findings, but they haven’t changed their verdict:
Up to the present: I remember 20-30 years ago reading about Spanish people with the family dietary rule “we don’t eat pork on Saturday”, and more recently about disputes in the Jewish community between a “Spanish” Judaism and “Orthodox” Judaism attributed to the covert and isolated nature of a Spanish community.
Huh. Those folks never met the Orthodox side of my family. In reality, a lot of otherwise observant Jews have at least tried bacon or shrimp, they just don’t admit it. I could see some lip-service Catholics eating that dish just to keep out of the hands of the Inquisition. For every person willing to die rather than eat pork or shellfish you’ll have another who will do it if they think that will protect their families.
There are no genes that are exclusively Jewish and found nowhere else due to the simple fact that people get jiggy with the neighbors and humans have a long history. Go back far enough we’re all related. Finding a “Jewish” gene is not proof of being Jewish. Conversely, a lack of them also does not rule out a person being Jewish.
We are talking about 15th century Portugal here. Most of the Jews in the world are not strictly observant now, don’t know how many were in the era of the inquisition. Judaism does not call for or encourage martyrdom so I doubt this means of sussing out Jews was effective. Add to that the dish is delicious.
Note that certain Y chromosome markers are present in modern Kohanim:
These results support the hypothesis of a common origin of the CMH in the Near East well before the dispersion of the Jewish people into separate communities, and indicate that the majority of contemporary Jewish priests descend from a limited number of paternal lineages.
Not sure how present those markers are in non Jewish men.
Brian
Also no mention of the practices in Genoa? Venice was reknowed for the “invention” of the ghetto. I find it hard to believe approximately similar social isolation requirements were not the case in most major Italian cities. Most communities of that era were essentially “small town” in mentality, everyone knew everyone else’s business and history. So unless Columbus and his whole family had successfully hid their identity for decades (centuries?) this fact would be well known, especially once he became famous.
My understanding is that he wasn’t all that famous in his own time. His fame is more a 18th-19th century thing.
Also, DNA indication is not always conclusive or reliable. My wife’s DNA breakdown came back showing a .02% probability of her have Jewish ancestry, a result that can be chalked up to error. She takes it seriously, despite me explaining it to her. Mine came back with a similar indication of possible Native American ancestry. I’m not about to start smoking a peace pipe.