Talk:History of the Jews in Mexico

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 2 February 2021 and 16 May 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): GriecoChapman.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 23:41, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Distribution throughout the country

I don't know why, but according to the INEGI, there are more Jews in Puebla or Oaxaca or Chipas than in those states that claim to have a thriving jewish population such as Jalisco, Chihuahua, Nuevo Leon or Baja California. Whay do you think? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.194.88.85 (talk) 21:34, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Thats interesting. I'll have to check it out. I'm in Oaxaca city and, as far as I know, there are probably less than ten Jews in the city today, with most of them being expatriates. Infact, there is a group who attempt to lead services at Passover, but rarely are able to gather enough people for a minyan. I know they put out flyers at UABJO to try to see if there are any visiting foreign students studying Spanish, who might be able to help them reach ten. Poor, rural, southern states such as Chiapas and Oaxaca are largely comprised of indiginous people; thats not to say there are not decendants of "crypto-jews" here, but the Jewish population in Oaxaca largely left after the end of the 1800s as the few industries that Jews had been involved in (cochineal trade, for instance) were replaced by industrial goods produced elsewhere. Anyhow, thanks for the tip... I'll check it out.. -- nsaum75 ^{!Dígame¡‎} 00:21, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Enriching the article

The present version of the article has no citations and largely is a pasted version of material from History of the Jews in Latin America. We need to improve this article, and one way to do that is to summarize material from relevant other articles; however, I wouldn't want us simply to paste in whole segments from those articles. The following sections came from related articles found while using Google to search "Mexico" and "Jew or Jewish or Judaism" (brace yourself! this is long!):

From Crypto-Judaism:

===Early colonial period - 1500s===

In the early days of the European colonization of Mexico, crypto-jewish conversos from both Spain and Portugal migrated to the Mexican port of Vera Cruz as well to Mexico City (the revitalized Tenochtitlan), a Spanish-controlled colony that was thought to be more lax in inquisition-related matters.

Many of the immigrants from Portugal were secondary immigrants from the Jewish Expulsion in Spain of 1492. However, a later similar decree was also issued in Portugal in 1497 effectively converted all Jewish children, making them wards of the state unless the parents also converted. Therefore, many of the early crypto-jewish migrants to Mexico in the early colonial days were technically first to second generation Portuguese with Spanish roots before that. The number of such Portuguese migrants was significant enough that the label of "Portuguese" became synonymous with "Jewish" throughout the Spanish colonies. Immigration to Mexico offered lucrative trade possibilities in a well-populated colony with nascent Spanish culture counterbalanced by a large non-Christian population. It was largely thought that inquisition-activities would be lax given that the lands were over-whelmingly populated by non-Christian indigenous peoples.

So many perceived crypto-jews were going to Mexico during the 1500s that officials complained in written documents to Spain that Spanish society in Mexico would become significantly Jewish. Officials found and condemned clandestine synagogues in Mexico City. At this point, colonial administrators instituted la Ley de la Pureza de Sangre (Blood Purity Laws), which prohibited migration to Mexico for New Christians (Nuevo Christiano), i.e. anyone who could not prove to be Old Christians for at least the last three generations. During this early time the Mexican Inquisition was formally instituted to insure the orthodoxy of all migrants into Mexico. The Mexico Inquisition was also deployed in the traditional manner to begin ensuring orthodoxy of converted indigenous peoples. The first burnings or Autos da Fe of the Mexican Inquisition was largely targeted at indigenous converts convicted of heresy or crypto-jews convicted of relapsing into their ancestral faith.

Except for the province of Nuevo Leon, the early migration of crypto-jewish converts did not continue unabated past the initiation of the Blood Purity Laws.

===Nuevo Leon - 1590s to early 1600s ===

The history of the colonization of Mexico can be described as a northward expansion over increasingly hostile geography well-populated by hostile tribes and loose confederations of indigenous peoples. This expansion was largely financed by the exploitation of mineral wealth, the exploitation of indigenous peoples as labor in mines and the establishment of ranchos for livestock. One troublesome region was a large expanse covering the North-Eastern quadrant of the current geography of Mexico. Chichimec, Apache and other tribes had proved resistant to Christianization and "settling" and in general were perceived to render the frontier (frontera) a lawless and unsettled region.

Luis Carvajal y de la Cueva was a Portuguese royal accountant and a New Christian, who received a royal charter to settle the large expanse of land in the hostile frontier, named Nuevo Leon. Significantly, Carvajal y de la Cueva received an exemption from the King of Spain to allow any New Christian to participate in the settling of this region. This exemption allowed an increased number of peoples to come to the hostile region while doing so with immigrants that were legally barred from entering Mexico elsewhere. Carvajal chartered ships from Portugal and the passenger list is thought to have consisted exclusively of New Christians.

With Carvajal as governor the colony was based in the city of Monterrey, currently in the state of Nuevo Leon. Within a few years, reports were filed in Mexico City claiming specifically of Jewish rites being performed in the Northern Province and of lax Christianization efforts to convert heathen indigenous peoples.

The governor, his immediate family members and others were called to appear before the Inquisition in Mexico City. They were arrested and jailed. The governor subsequently died in jail, while his family members were rehabilitated. One of these was Anna Carvajal, a niece of the Governor. She and others were eventually caught again and sentenced to a burning at the stake for relapsing.

The governor's nephews changed their name to Lumbroso. One of these was Joseph Lumbroso, also known as Luis de Carvajal, el mozo, who is said to have circumcised himself in the desert to conform to Jewish law. Two other nephews also changed their names to Lumbroso and became famous rabbis in Italy.

During the time in which Governor Carvajal was in office, the city of Monterrey became a target of migration by other crypto-jews feeling the pressure of the Mexican Inquisition in the south. Thus, the story of Nuevo Leon and the founding of Monterrey is significant for openly concentrating a crypto-jewish community from all parts of Mexico. Such Jewish communities did not exist in Mexico until the immigration of Ashkenazi communities in the late 1800s and 1900s.

...

• Luis de Carvajal was the governor of the state of Nuevo Leon, a northern Mexico province in which the restriction against immigration from conversos was relaxed in order to encourage migration to the peril-fraught frontier. He was responsible for bringing a significant group of crypto-jewish conversos living in Portugal since the Expulsion of 1492.

• Luis de Carvajal, el mozo, was the nephew of Jose Luis Carvajal y de la Cueva, the only crypto Jew whose memoir and religious writings have been preserved.

From List of Mexican Jews:

Jewish immigration to Latin America began with seven sailors arriving in Christopher Columbus's crew . Since then, the Jewish population of Latin America has risen to more than 500,000 — more than half of whom live in Argentina, with large communities also present in Brazil and Mexico.

In Mexico, Mexico City has the largest Jewish populations. The second and third largest Jewish groups are in Guadalajara and in Monterrey (several early settlers were Jews) The book Estudio histórico de la migración judía a México 1900-1950 has records of almost 11,300 who immigrated to Mexico between 1900 and 1950. A majority of these (7,023) where Ashkenazi Jews who originated from Eastern Europe, mainly from Poland. 2,640 others arrived from either Spain or the Ottoman Empire and 1,619 from Cuba and the United States. In 1990 there were almost 58,000 and 45,000 people in 2000 professing the Jewish religion in the country, according to the INEGI.

==External links==

• tribuna.org.mx: Official site of the Jewish community in Mexico
• (in Spanish) After the tracks of the Jews in Mexico article on El Universal

From Mexico:

Judaism has been practiced in Mexico for centuries. Many are descended of Jewish people who were converted forcibly to Catholicism in 1492 or earlier, and were forced to practice their religion in secret until the Inquisition was abolished in Mexico and they were free again to practice their ancestral faith openly. There are estimated to be more than 45,000-50,000 (some estimates say 60,000) Jews in Mexico today. (Advierten una reducción en el número de mexicanos que profesan la religión católica, El Informador, 11 August 2002. Retrieved 15 May 2006)

It also would be good to have a wikilink somewhere within the article to such articles as Who is a Jew? for the unfamiliar with the ins and outs of the term "Jew." Lawikitejana 04:54, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Reponse:

Actualy the most important points have been referenced and cited in this article. Furthermore, we can't just copy and paste information from the internet as you suggest. It needs to come from reliable and trusted sources, which we can cite. Furthermore, this article wasn't just copy and pasted from the History of Jews in Latin America, but rather viceversa, and this article has much more detail than that article. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Suyw (talk • contribs) 20:10, 15 April 2007 (UTC).

New Article

Im pretty sure there are Mexican jews. Not to be confused with jews in mexico.

150,000 or 50,000 Mexican Jews...which is the correct amount?

The article first cites a number of 150,000 Mexican Jews, then it proceeds to breakdown the current population to just around 50,000. Which is it?--96.229.104.243 (talk) 07:39, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

It's 50k, I'm fixing it right now. -Solid Reign (talk) 14:14, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

since the times of the Inquisition

Since the 12th Century? Really? Hcobb (talk) 01:49, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

This article does not claim "12th century," and the time of the Inquisition spans many centuries. Indeed, in terms of Jewish history with relation to the Inquisition, years after the 12th century such as 1492 are notable since Jews were forced to flee Spain itself. I suggest reading that article in more detail. --OuroborosCobra (talk) 00:58, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

I'm just complaining about the flowery term when the Spanish conquest would be a much more precise marker. Hcobb (talk) 19:48, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Juliantla and many towns founded by Crypto-jews

Many towns in Mexico was founded by Iberic people with crypto-jews settlement, this people was Portuguese and Spanish, they was given encomiendas by Hernán Cortés after of Conquest of Mexico Tenochtitlan. [1]

Juliantla (now, Taxco munipality in Guerrero state) was a small villages founded by Marranos, [2] and this is new attention focus (with other Mexican villages of old New Spain) about Crypto Judaism studies in actually Mexico. This people was conversos to Roman Catholic in a difficult moment by many people from Spain.--Marrovi (talk) 14:19, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

Those do not appear to be reliable sources for history topics.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 14:41, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:History of the Jews in Abkhazia which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 05:09, 5 June 2020 (UTC)