Suggestions:

• Find out: What happened with the inquisitors, the Catholic Monarchs, and the Jews?

Reading:

Each participant receives a copy of the text with the following instructions:

Read the following fragment of a letter in which Fernando and Isabel, the Catholic Monarchs, officially explain to the first two inquisitors what their task will be:


Fernando and Isabel, by the Grace of God the King
and Queen of Castile and Aragon…send you,
Fray Miguel of Morillo, ... peace and benediction.
It is known that our Holy Father
has indicated that in some kingdoms there are
bad Christians, men and women, unfaithful and
heretical, who have been baptized and have
received the sacraments of Holy Baptism
without compulsion or pressure.
Bearing only the name and pretending to
be Christians, they have returned and keep
returning to the mistaken and perfidious faith of
the Jews, observing the ritual of their religion,
the rituals and customs of the Jews. They
abandoned and left the true faith, the honor of
our holy Catholic faith, and the commandments
that must be met and obeyed by every faithful
Christian. The result is that not only do these bad
and unbelieving Christians obstinately remain
and persist in their heresy and blindness, but
their sons, daughters and other descendants and
all who enter into contact with them, also learn from
them and stain themselves with the same lack of
faith and with heresy. At our request, your Holiness
gave us permission to choose and designate two
or three bishops or archbishops, or honest and
just men, be they priests, laymen, or religious
men, of more than forty years of age, whose way
of life is honest and who are people of
conscience…to act as inquisitors in any part of
our dominions.




Analysis:

Underline the passages that point out the reasons of the monarchs and of the Pope. Share your answers with the rest of the class. For what other event are the Catholic Monarchs known? Do you find a point in common between both events?

Required Materials:

- texts photocopied for the participants
- sheets of paper
- pens and pencils.

Bibliography

• Illuminated texts from the time period
• A History of Private Life. Duby, George and others. Edit. Tuquest
• Tomes corresponding to the period.
• Texts included in the development of the activity.
• Encyclopaedia Judaica. Keter Publishing House Ltd. Jerusalem, Israel.