After the death of Isabella the Catholic in 1504, the New Christians wanted her daughter, the queen Dona Joanna,¹ to grant them protection, as she promised in her letter from November 22, 1511: “I pardon you from the punishments you suffered for having opposed the laws of the Inquisition.”

This agreement between the queen and the new converts was nothing but fantasy. As before, the Inquisition did not stop its surveillance of the Jews who opposed its rule. The wood did not cease burning and the judges of the Inquisition continued their infernal work during the reigns of Carlos the Fifth² and Philip the Second³ with the same force as before.

In 1625 the inquisitors of Seville celebrated an auto-da-fé of burning Manuel Lopez and three women for having conducted business with Jews and for tenaciously refusing to admit their blame. That day, the crowd that accompanied the pitiful spectacle was enormous and the murderers’ camp was so wide that neither people nor carriages or soldiers on horseback could move in the streets.

In another auto-da-fé celebrated in Seville on April 14, 1660, eighty people were burned at the stake, as recounted in the portrayal of the celebrated and elevated poet, Enrique de Paz.⁴

As the poet fled to Holland, the inquisitors continued to make his effigy from paper and burn it with such intention, as though it was the man himself.

It was told that one day in the city to which he fled, Amsterdam (an important city in Holland), the poet encountered one of his friends who had just arrived, escaping persecution like Enrique de Paz.

“Ah!” – said the new arrival to señor Enrique - “Do you know that your effigy was burned in Seville?”

“Really?” – Enrique responded, laughing – “May it be God’s will that all my misfortunes are of this kind. I permit the Inquisition to burn me in this way, as long as, God willing, I myself am not in their hands.”

We now turn to the reasons for the inquisitors’ abhorrence of Enrique de Paz. Everyone accused him of lighting candles on shabbat evening and conversing with Satan. Enrique, upon hearing these ridiculous rumors, could not help but laugh and make jokes. But one of his friends advised him to flee Spain, where a person’s existence is not assured.

Two days later, Enrique de Paz left for Holland. The Inquisition noted his disappearance and believed that he was in hiding. They searched for him profusely, trying to capture him.

To be continued…