Dreaming in Medieval: The Life of Pablo de Santa María and Beyond: A Novel

By Judith Krieger Macpherson

Solomon Ha Levi is the chief rabbi of Burgos, in the Kingdom of Castile, but in 1391, after anti-Jewish riots raged throughout the land, he decided to convert to Christianity. He becomes a priest and takes the name Pablo de Santa María. In time, he is appointed Bishop of Burgos and joins the heady world of court politics and church hierarchy. He is not alone amongst the Jewish elite of his time to convert to Christianity, but he begins to doubt the sincerity of his conversion and regrets the loss of the life he left behind.

His wife, Yehudit, does not convert to Christianity, and she lives alone in Burgos. In her dreams, she and her husband discuss all topics related to life and love, and they also discuss the rising tide of anti-Jewish hatred that will culminate in disaster for the Jews of Spain.

Pablo’s descendants, all conversos, ride this wave and seek to preserve life and limb as they try to outwit their oppressors.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Feb 6, 2024
• ISBN: 9798823019040

Judith Krieger Macpherson

Judith Krieger Macpherson has a PhD in Hispanic Languages and Literatures from the University of California at Los Angeles. Her doctoral thesis is about the life, times, and literary production of Pablo de Santa María. After completing her doctorate, she decided to write a novel about him in the hope of sharing his history with anyone interested in the fate of the Spanish Jews who were persecuted and finally expelled from Spain in 1492. She is passionate about her subject and feels strongly that readers of her book might glean insights into why antisemitism is a constant, and why it is on the rise again today. She is a retired teacher and lives with her husband, two cats, and twenty chickens in Somis, California.

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© 2024 Judith Krieger Macpherson. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 01/02/2024

ISBN: 979-8-8230-1903-3 (sc)

ISBN: 979-8-8230-1902-6 (hc)

ISBN: 979-8-8230-1904-0 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2023923769

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Contents

Historical Note

Chapter 1 Yehudit

Chapter 2 Yehudit

Chapter 3 Pablo

Chapter 4 Pablo

Chapter 5 Yehudit

Chapter 6 Yehudit

Chapter 7 Pablo

Chapter 8 Yehudit

Chapter 9 Yehudit

Chapter 10 Yehudit

Chapter 11 Pablo

Chapter 12 Yehudit

Chapter 13 Pablo’s letter to his daughter Miriam

Chapter 14 Yehudit

Chapter 15 Letter from Miriam to Alonso de Cartagena, her older brother

Chapter 16 Yehudit

Chapter 17 Yehudit

Chapter 18 Letter from Miriam to her children

Chapter 19 Raquel

Chapter 20 Raquel

Chapter 21 Deborah

Chapter 22 Deborah

Chapter 23 Deborah

Chapter 24 Debra

Chapter 25 Debra

Chapter 26 Debra

Chapter 27 Deborah

Chapter 28 Debra

Chapter 29 Debra

Chapter 30 Debra

Chapter 31 Naples

Chapter 32 Naples

Chapter 33 Debra

Chapter 34 Judy and Ross

Epilogue

Historical Characters

Glossary

Bibliography

Notes

Acknowledgements

For my husband,

and for the Israeli people

Historical Note

This novel takes place in fifteenth century Castile, one of several kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula, which by the end of the century would form what today we call Spain. In January of 1492 the armies of King Ferdinand of Aragón and Queen Isabella of Castile captured the Kingdom of Granada in the south from the Moors. It was the last enemy stronghold, and now captured, the unification of all the kingdoms under a single monarchy was complete.

During this century anti-Semitism was on the rise, and there was immense pressure on Jews to convert to Christianity. The monarchs and the Church were intent upon achieving political and religious unity in the land, and they felt strongly that all their subjects should belong to the Catholic religion. Thousands of Jews converted rather than be forced, and many tried to remain faithful to their Judaism.

On March 31, 1492, Ferdinand and Isabella issued the Alhambra Decree. It stated that all Spanish Jews must either convert to Christianity or leave the country by July 31. It is not known exactly how many Jews departed at that time, but it is estimated that between 50,000 and100,000 went into exile.

Chapter One

Yehudit

Burgos, Kingdom of Castile

September 24, 1435 29 Elul 5195

I have just been told that my husband died last month, here in Burgos, right where he began. He died on August 31, which corresponds to the 5th of the month of Elul on the Hebrew calendar. Because I am a Jew, I keep Jewish time, but I live in a Christian world, and so, of course, I also keep Christian time.

I never thought that I would outlive my husband because I always saw him as stronger and more robust than I, but maybe he wasn’t. In any event, I am still here, and he is not. He would have been eighty-three when he died. I know this because he was five years older than I, and I shall soon turn seventy-eight.

It is the eve of Rosh Ha Shana, the Jewish New Year, and I am alone in my house. Well, I must correct myself. I am not completely alone because I live with my two cats, Guapa and Pilar. Guapa is a female calico, very affectionate and sweet, and she talks to me constantly. Pilar is also a female, all white and elegant, with yellow eyes. She usually follows me around the house and then choses a spot where she can lounge, shed her hairs, and keep an eye on me. I count myself very lucky to have these two cats because they are excellent companions, but I know that it would not take much for me to be deprived of their company should the wrong persons learn of their presence in this house. Despite their well-deserved reputation as ratters, they are thought by many in the Church to be associated with witchcraft and the Devil. Some people even derive pleasure from treating them hideously, and so of course, Guapa and Pilar do not leave this house.

It is a warm evening, and I have opened the windows which are tall and are set into the thick wall of the building. There is even a space for me to sit and look out onto the courtyard. After sundown today, I lit candles in honor of the New Year, and thanked God for enriching our lives with His holiness.

I inherited this house after my father died. It is the house in which I grew up, and it has been my home for most of my life except for the thirteen years during which I lived with my husband and our five children in another neighborhood. This house is in the upper section of the old Jewish quarter on Calle Fernán González, and its stone exterior is of a piece with the grey granite which constitutes the surface of most of the walls of the city.

I returned here because in the summer of 1391, the home which I shared with my husband and children was destroyed during the riots that ravaged the Jewish neighborhoods of the city. Mobs had been roused to anger against us Jews throughout the peninsula, and when they reached Burgos, they continued, stirred by current complaints and centuries of old hatred. We were much envied and resented because of the wealth and privilege of some in our community. Also, we bore eternal blame for having been the killers of Christ and other supposed atrocities against Christians, which it was assumed we were committing up to this very day.

My parents’ home was miraculously spared during these riots, perhaps because it is in a remote corner of the judería. Although my mother had died earlier, my father survived the devastation, and I came here to be with him and hopefully remain safe. My husband had made other plans for himself and our five children after the riots, which I shall soon describe.

I must confess that lately I have been feeling my age. When I look in the mirror and see my white curls that used to be lustrous and black, I don’t just feel my age, I see it staring me in the face. My skin droops, my freckles have faded, and I seem to have shrunk. I do not move so quickly anymore, but my eyes are happy. No matter if I am preoccupied or worried about something, I usually have a mild smile on my face. Just not right now.

The intensity of the sadness I am feeling about my husband’s death is a bit surprising. We have not lived together for over forty years, a circumstance —which had I been able to prevent it from happening—I would have; but the power of choice was not mine, it was his. My sadness at his death knifed swiftly and uncontrollably to areas of my mind which I had long labored to silence.

To my astonishment I was first struck by a deep sorrow at not having been able to say goodbye to him in person. Why, I asked myself, after all these years apart, would I even imagine that I could have been at his side at that moment? But I did, which just goes to show that emotions live by their own rules and usually get their own way. Did I wish that I could have seen in his eyes and heard from his lips that he realized in the end that he lost the most important part of his existence when he lost me? Yes, I cannot deny it. I would have wanted to hear that, but mostly I would have just wanted to be with him.

But it has already occurred to me that despite the painful memories which have been newly aroused, and despite the raw pain of my husband’s death, I still exist on solid ground. It is, as I said, the beginning of a new year, and I am going back in my mind over my behavior of the past one. I pray that God will judge my efforts to obey Him as acceptable, and that He will support me in my determination that the rest of my life should not be given over to sadness and resignation.

Of course, none of us can completely shed the memory of past suffering, but a new and compelling idea entered my mind. I decided to keep a diary, the one that you see before your eyes. How you came upon these pages, I know not, and I have no objection to your reading them. But I must emphasize that I am writing for myself because the act of writing calms and gratifies me, and it is a kind of adventure. I should be glad if my children were to someday read these pages because they would then become aware of their mother’s perspective on a world which welcomed them but shunned her. In any case I know that what I say here will not change anyone’s opinion about what I did or what happened, and that is not my goal. I have the sense that as I write, I shall discover new feelings which could shatter my peace of mind, but I am not concerned. I welcome deeper truths and am always better off in their company.

One awareness has already presented itself to me, one which until now, I have been reluctant to acknowledge. My husband’s life was a tragedy. It was a tragedy because he felt compelled to relinquish his identity and to foreswear everyone and everything he knew in order to survive in a world which would have hated and rejected him, or worse, had he remained who he was from the beginning.

I shall now go back and try to describe our life together and the events and circumstances which resulted in its upheaval. First, you must know that until shortly before our separation, my husband was a Jew. His name was Solomon Ha Levi, and he was the chief rabbi of Burgos. He had been appointed to that post by King John I of Castile in 1379, and as such, not only was he the leader of our Jewish community in Burgos, but he was also a respected figure outside the judería. We had five children, and all of them had Hebrew names. Our two oldest sons were Moshe, and Abraham, our daughter was Miriam, and our two younger sons were Yehoshua and Benjamin. Solomon was frequently asked by Castilian monarchs to serve their diplomatic and financial interests, and their appreciation of his services generally proved beneficial to the Jews at large.

I remember well the day he finally announced to me that our relationship would have to end. I say finally because during the weeks prior to that day, he had been behaving strangely and was uncharacteristically distant. It was a stiflingly hot day in June, and I attributed part of his lethargy and gloomy disposition to the heat. I knew that he was deeply troubled by certain events which were occurring in our community, but that did not explain his reticence towards me. He was typically happy to see me at any given moment, and I him.

I encouraged him to confide in me, but for several moments he would not, and he avoided my eyes. Finally, he opened up. I sat across from him and saw a look of misery in his eyes which competed eerily with a stiff resolve in his posture.

Yehudit, he began. I never imagined that one day I would be so affected by earthly events and religious conviction that I would feel the need to change who I am and to separate myself from you and our children.

His voice, normally musical and enthusiastic, was hollow and flat, and his eyes of a sudden were dull and without expression. I was stunned and went cold. I stood and walked over to him.

In one long sentence he had managed to describe a world in which he felt he could no longer exist, and to envision a new one in which I was not to be present. His words were shocking and unexpected, and I did not wish to understand them. Had I not awakened that very morning to my usual and regular world which now, in less than a minute, had been virtually eliminated and taken away from me without any participation on my part?

He went on. His breath was hot and heavy in the already hot room.

I have decided that I cannot continue to be a Jew, Yehudit, and I am going to convert to Christianity and to become a Catholic priest. This means, he continued, that I shall have to leave you and leave Burgos.

He looked squarely at me and saw the bewilderment on my face.

I would like you to convert with me, he continued, because you will be safer as a Christian, and though we cannot live together, I shall be better able to protect you.

I think it important to mention here that around that time, Solomon’s decision to convert to Christianity was not unique. Other cultured Jews of high social rank had also come to this decision, and I shall soon make clear why this was the case. But now I return to the numbing moment of his announcement.

Solomon, I said. My heart was pounding, and my eyes filled with tears. What! A priest? Solomon, why? You are a rabbi! You are a Jew, and no personal decision or external event can change that. Your mother is a Jew, and your father is a Jew, I continued. Your entire family is Jewish! And what about us, Solomon? How can you do this? We shall not survive apart! It will not work, I reasoned. We shall both be miserable! This is a catastrophe!

At the time we were both in our late thirties, and or oldest child was eleven.

He looked at me, then rose and crossed the room and pulled me to him. We kissed, and for a short while, we forgot all about the heat of the day because our own heat commanded all our attention.

Solomon was a tall man, strong, and from hearty Jewish stock. He was the oldest of eight siblings, all still alive, and all, like he, were energetic and ambitious by nature. His father, Isaac Ha Levi, had moved the family from Calatayud in Navarre to Burgos; and in 1343, well before Solomon was born, he became royal tax collector for King Alfonso XI in the Burgos diocese. He never converted to Christianity, although Solomon tried mightily to convince him to do so. My father also never converted.

As we embraced, we both tried desperately to pretend that he had not said what he had just said, and that we could go back in time, and that his words would be nowhere to be found. But his words had been spoken, and they had hit their mark. He had heard my response, that we would simply not survive apart, and that his plan would not work. I pulled away from him gently and tried to distract him.

Do you remember our first kiss, Solomon? I asked.

Of course, he did. We both did. It would have been impossible to forget such a thing. It had been such a shock and delighted us so, that we both gave ourselves over to it without thinking. We did what came naturally, as if we knew what we were doing, which we mostly did not, and we did not care.

That kiss happened after we were married under the chuppa. Four of Solomon’s brothers had held up the beautiful wedding canopy, which was stretched over four wooden poles, and was decorated with blue stripes on a white field. It was a cloth symbol above our heads of the home we stood ready to build together, and we were already eager to actually and finally be in that home so that we could become true partners. The ceremony ended only after Solomon stomped hard on a glass which had been placed under a cloth, and whose shards served to remind us that at times of personal happiness we should not forget the tragedies that have happened to our people.

We had liked each other right from the start. We met for the first time after our parents had arranged our marriage, and Solomon came to our home looking eager and happy. I could tell that he liked what he saw, and I did too, and in a very short while, we both felt a mutual attraction of a sort which was new to both of us. My father had left us alone in the main room of our home, and soon we had all we could do to keep from moving our chairs closer to each other and holding hands. But we did not. We contented ourselves with the joy of the moment and followed what we both knew to be the custom of refraining from physical intimacy until after marriage.

Solomon was already a rabbi when we met, and like all rabbis, he had studied the various holy texts which describe proper behavior and attitudes about sexual matters in marriage. Naturally, we did not discuss this subject during our betrothal meeting, but we did after we were married. He told me that he and his brothers had spent long hours reading and discussing these topics because it was important that they know something about pleasing their future wives. It was also considered important because being young men, they had many sexual urges which they basically needed to know what to do with before they could satisfy them with their future wife. Before we were betrothed, I had not known that that such matters were part of the education of a young Jewish man, but after we were married, Solomon told me a great deal about it.

For example, he began one evening as we were relaxing in bed, the rabbis teach that intercourse between husband and wife is good and important for the soul, and that if it is done with a pure heart, it is considered holy. That is what God intended, he assured me. A man must always be patient and arouse his wife, and woo her first with words, and never force her. He must be sure that she has her orgasm before he does. Passion, he continued, was introduced for the purpose of motivating us to procreate, because that is God’s ultimate goal.

This all sounded good to me.

In her day, my mother had subtly but efficiently made the point that I need not feel obligated out of modesty to keep my clothes on in bed on my wedding night, as many people feel they should. As a matter of fact, I later learned from Solomon, that according to the Babylonian Talmud, men and women should have close bodily contact during intercourse. So, my mother was right, as usual.

In any case, of course, words and instructions can mean only just so much when the time comes to act, and when the time came for me and Solomon to be together in our marital bed, I think he mostly just forgot about his formal education. Maybe not completely, but I am certain that he did what he did without thinking too much.

It worked. He was quite naked from the start, and after our first full kiss, we fell off the bed on to the floor because the bed was low, and his thick brown hair had tangled with my long black curls, and we started to laugh. We were laughing so hard that we lost our purchase. It was almost as if an earthquake had bowled us over and changed our location. We had to stop kissing briefly so that we could catch our breath, set ourselves right, and resume. We did not even try to get back on to the bed. It was of little importance at that moment.

The Persians, Solomon followed up a few months later, as we continued to discuss matters of sexual interest, follow the custom of having intercourse in their clothes.

That sounded rather unpleasant to me.

On another occasion he informed me that the Torah even prescribes the number of times a week, a month, or a year that a man is obligated to provide sexual pleasure to his wife. He hastened to explain that this commandment is adjusted based on a man’s profession. Some men had to be away from their family homes for long stretches of time.

Well, now I must return to the present and finish my description of what I was certain would be our last kiss. Solomon’s brown hair, always unruly, was now threaded with silver, as were his peot, the side locks required of all Jewish men by the law of Leviticus. The thought of living the rest of my life without seeing his beautiful head of unruly hair every time he entered the house made me weak.

What of our children, Solomon? I asked.

Solomon had already made plans to place them in a convent where they would live and receive a Christian education, but of course I did not know this yet. Given the dangerous circumstances stemming from the anti-Jewish riots which I mentioned earlier, his decision could have been thought to have merit, though I clearly did not think so at the time. But I am getting ahead of myself.

In retrospect I must confess that I should not have been as surprised as I was by his fateful announcement. Yes, his noticeable preoccupation around that time was something of a mystery to me, but I realize now that I had failed to appreciate the impact that his studies were having upon him. Being a rabbi, Solomon was of course steeped in all matters relating to the Old Testament, and like most rabbis, he knew its contents by heart. But throughout the year preceding his decision to convert, he had been immersing himself in the study of the New Testament, unlike most of his peers who thought it unnecessary to do so. I was only mildly surprised by his interest in Christian texts, and I did not regard this interest in any way as cause for alarm. Solomon was an intensely curious person, and this his was part of his charm. As far as I was concerned, it was much in character for him to explore a wide variety of theological and philosophical ideas.

It