The history of the Jews in Mexico began in 1519 with the arrival of Conversos, often called Marranos or "Crypto-Jews", referring to those Jews forcibly converted to Catholicism and that then became subject to the Spanish Inquisition.
During the period of the Viceroyalty of New Spain (1521–1821), a number of Jews came to Mexico, especially during the period of the Iberian Union (1580–1640), when Spain and Portugal were ruled by the same monarch. That political circumstance allowed freer movement by Portuguese crypto-Jewish merchants into Spanish America. When the Portuguese regained their independence from Spain in 1640, Portuguese merchants in New Spain were prosecuted by the Mexican Inquisition. When the monopoly of the Roman Catholic Church in Mexico was replaced with religious toleration during the nineteenth-century Liberal reform, Jews could openly immigrate to Mexico. They came from Europe and later from the crumbling Ottoman Empire, including Syria, until the first half of the 20th century.
Today, most Jews in Mexico are descendants of this immigration and still divided by diasporic origin, principally Yiddish-speaking Ashkenazim and Judaeo-Spanish-speaking Sephardim. It is an insular community with its own religious, social, and cultural institutions, mostly in Mexico City, Monterrey and Guadalajara.
History Viceroyalty of New Spain Jews and Conversos were part of the conquest and colonization in Mexico, and key participants in the transatlantic and transpacific trade networks, as well as the development of domestic trade.Eva Alexandra Ushmany. "The Participation of New Christians and Crypto-Jews in the Conquest, Colonization, and Trade of Spanish America, 1521-1660," in The Jews and the Expansion of Europe to the West, 1450-1800, Paolo Bernardini and Norman Fiering, eds. New York: Berghahn Books 1991. Conversos accompanied Hernán Cortés in 1519. These were members of Jewish families which had been forcibly converted to Christianity to avoid expulsion from Spain after the reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula from the Moors. The reconquest was followed by the Spanish Inquisition, which made the Conversos one of its targets with accusations of reverting to Judaism. During this time, there were two types of Conversos: Crypto-Jews and Jews who fully converted to Catholicism. The Jews who converted were used to report Crypto-Jews to the Catholic Church, and consequently, they were awarded with high-power positions within the Catholic Church. Furthermore, during this time, the Catholic Church was responsible for social welfare and was the most powerful entity. Converso migration to the new Spanish colony began in 1530 after most of the violence from the conquest of the Aztec Empire had subsided, and the Spanish Inquisition continued. For several decades, the families lived peacefully, integrating into Mexico's elite, with some becoming prominent Catholic clergy and others returning to Jewish practice.
David L. Nathan proposed that the first coins minted in the Western Hemisphere by Spanish Conquistadors in Mexico City feature a Hebrew letter aleph (), suggesting evidence for a Jewish presence or influence in Mexico in 1536.Nathan, D. L. “A Hebrew Letter on the New World's First Coins?” The Shekel. Vol. XXXIX, No. 1, January–February 2006, pp. 8-14. http://numismatics.org/collection/2006.13.1 He notes that nearly all of the dies prepared under the tenure of the first assayer use the purported aleph symbol in place of the Christian cross potent mark, found almost universally on medieval Spanish and Mexican coinage. Nathan goes on to consider possible Jewish family connections to the known early Mexican mint workers.Hoge, Robert Wilson, Current Cabinet Activities, ANS Magazine, Spring 2007. http://numismatics.org/magazine/cabinetspring07/
The persecution of Jews came to New Spain along with the conquistadors. Bernal Díaz del Castillo described in his writings various executions of soldiers during the conquest of Mexico because they were accused of being practicing Jews, including Hernando Alonso, who built the boats Cortés used to assault Tenochtitlán. However, the Mexican Inquisition was not fully established until 1571, when it became a threat to Converso and Jewish communities with an initial purge of them from 1585 to 1601. In 1606, Mexico received an order by the King of Spain to free Conversos in Inquisition prisons. This relaxing of the Inquisition in Mexico, which was never as severe as in Spain, allowed more to come over in the first half of the 17th century. New Conversos settled in Mexico City, Acapulco, Veracruz and Campeche, as these cities offered the most opportunities for mercantile activity. Some did move to the more-outlying areas, such as Zacatecas, but they still afforded more opportunities than places farther north. There was a second Inquisition persecution of Conversos from 1642 to 1649. Then, the focus shifted to matters such as blasphemy and moral infractions. However, during the entire colonial period, practicing Jews in Spain or elsewhere could not enter Spanish colonial territory.
One notable episode during the colonial period was the establishment of the New Kingdom of León. In 1567, the Carvajal family arrived in New Spain under nobleman Luis de Carabajal y Cueva. With the exception of him and a cousin, the family was Crypto-Jewish. In 1579, Carvajal was granted land in what is now northeastern Mexico, just north of what was then considered New Spain. The area welcomed both Conversos and practicing Jews, with about 75% of the initial settlers being secretly Jewish. Some theories state that Monterrey developed as a commercial center despite its colonial era remoteness because of Crypto-Jewish influence. However, Luis de Carvajal and members of his family were persecuted in 1589 for practicing Judaism. De Carvajal's nephew, Luis de Carvajal the Younger, kept memoirs detailing his life and persecution; these are now considered to be the earliest writings by a Jew in the Americas. The auto-da-fé of Mariana Carvajal has become part of Mexican art and literature. By 1641, the colony had grown, and some of the settlers would later move to establish new settlements in Coahuila, Texas, and New Santander.
The largest number of prosecutions by the Mexican Inquisition occurred in the wake of the 1640 dissolution of the Iberian Union, when Spain and Portugal had been ruled by the same monarch. Portuguese merchants more easily entered Spanish America, and a complex community of crypto-Jews emerged, connected to transatlantic and trans-Pacific trade networks. Evidence from individual cases prosecuted by the Mexican Inquisition indicates that most crypto-Jews in Mexico or their parents had been born in Portugal, primarily from the Portuguese capital, Lisbon, or from Castelo Branco.Jonathan I. Israel, "Portuguese Crypto-Judaism in New Spain, 1569-1649" in Diasporas within a Diaspora: Jews, Crypto-Jews and the World Maritime Empires (1540–1740). Leiden: Brill 2002, pp. 97-98. There were a few very wealthy Portuguese merchants, who were leaders of the community, but most were shopkeepers and artisans. A prominent merchant was Simón Váez, whom the Inquisition accused of allowing his house to serve as a synagogue until the 1642 persecutions began. He had risen from humble circumstances, but he and other wealthy merchants came to socialize with crown officials and to play a prominent role among the elite.Israel, "Portuguese Crypto-Judaism" pp. 98-99.Eva A. Uchmany, "Simón Váez Sevilla", Micahel, Journal of the History of the Jews in the Diaspora, viii (1983), pp. 126-61. Their wealth was based on asientos (licenses) for the black slave trade in Mexico since Portugal controlled the African coast, where they were sourced. Portuguese merchants also held contracts for tax farming and supplying the Spanish fleet and forts with stores and munitions.Israel, "Portuguese Crypto-Judaism", pp. 101-02.
Post-Independence immigration After Mexico gained its Independence, it abolished the Inquisition, but the Catholic religion was declared the official religion. The remaining Crypto-Jews still did not openly admit to their Jewish identity but began to observe various Jewish rituals, and from 1825 to 1860, a few European Jews from Germany and Eastern Europe arrived. The immigrants were not allowed to become Mexican citizens, but their main challenges to living in Mexico were economic, rather than social or religious. In 1861, a group rented a hall to celebrate Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the first recorded instance of public Jewish worship. In 1865, Maximilian I of Mexico issued an edict of religious tolerance, with representatives from Jewish organizations in Europe and the United States coming to Mexico to explore the possibilities for immigration. From 1864 to 1867, Maximilian invited some European Jews from France, Belgium, and Austria-Hungary to settle in Mexico. By 1867, only twenty Jewish families were living in Mexico, with about a dozen more elsewhere.
During the Reform War, the Liberals under Benito Juárez reinforced freedom of religion, allowing those Jews who arrived after that time Mexican citizenship and full integration. In the 1880s, a significant wave of Jewish immigration began as the Mexican government invited a number of Jewish bankers to operate in the country, and the assassination of Czar Alexander II in Russia pushed Jews to leave the country. The Jews settled in Mexico City and in various other areas of the country, including rural areas, often as traveling salesmen. About half of Mexico's Jewish population can be linked to this wave of immigration. Another group of Jews that came at this time were industrialists from France. However, many of the French arrivals were not interested in staying permanently and returned after making their fortunes in Mexico. However, a few married and stayed, leaving behind in Mexico City last names such as Herzog, Scherer, and Levy.
Jewish immigrants in Mexico City eventually built businesses such as a haberdashery on Madero Street that was a center of European fashion and La Esmeralda jewelry store (now the Museo del Estanquillo) with a reputation similar to Tiffany's on the corner of Isabel la Católica and Madero. The Jewish owner of El Salon Rojo, one of the capital's first movie houses, helped to develop the country's first Jewish cemetery.
During the very late 19th century into the 20th, Sephardic and Middle Eastern Jews also began arriving from what is now Syria and the rest of the crumbling Ottoman Empire, forming the Maguén David and Monte Sinaí communities. These, with those still coming from Eastern Europe, were usually poorer, shoemakers, furriers, peddlers, and tailors, who first lived in cities such as Puebla, Veracruz, and Chiapas before migrating to Mexico City. For the Sephardic Jews, similar language and culture made it easier for them to adapt.
In 1900, the Mexican census counted 134 Jews in the country. From then until 1950, an estimated 7,300 Jewish people immigrated to Mexico from Eastern Europe, 2,640 from Spain or the former Ottoman Empire, and 1,620 from Cuba and the United States. These various Jewish groups formed their own religious congregations and social institutions. Turkish Jews began holding open religious services in 1901 and founded the first Talmud Torah in 1905, as an educational institution for boys. Ashkenazi Jews began holding open services as early as 1904. The first formal Jewish organization in Mexico, the Monte Sinaí community, was founded in 1912.