The debate over a crypto-Jewish presence in New Mexico: The role of ethnographic allegory and orientalism

Sociology of Religion, Spring, 2002 by Michael P. Carroll

Unfortunately, whatever the merits of Halevy's general argument (i.e., focusing on Rabbinical customs as the key to differentiating crypto-Judaism from traditions of Adventist origin) her conclusion in this particular case depends upon a false premise: that Sabbath candle-lighting is not a part of Adventist tradition. Plugging different combinations of relevant key words (e.g., Adventist, Sabbath, candles, etc.) into an Internet search engine (Google), I easily located more than a dozen accounts written by contemporary Adventists who suggest that "Friday night candle-lighting" is one of the ways in their family celebrates the Sabbath. Why some contemporary Adventist families light candles on Friday night is something that in itself needs to be explained. The fact itself, however, raises the possibility that even this "Rabbinic" practice might be of Adventist origin.

Plausibilities

One of the things that almost certainly works in favor of the CJNM hypothesis is its inherent plausibility. The Inquisition in both Spain and New Spain, after all, did persecute crypto-Jews, and so it seems to make sense that a substantial number of crypto-Jews might seek to escape such persecution by settling in an area on the fringes of Spain's colonial empire. Plausibility is furthered enhanced by noting (as Hordes and others have noted) that the two most important "waves" of colonization in New Mexico either coincided with or followed closely upon an escalation of anti-Jewish activity by the Holy Office. Thus, the establishment of the colony by Juan de Onate and others in 1598, and the arrival of additional settlers in the early 1600s, coincided with a dramatic increase in the persecution of Jews in Spain; the re-conquest and re-settlement of New Mexico in the 1690s (following the Pueblo Revolt of 1680) followed upon an intense campaign against Mexican crypto- Jews in 1642-1649. It happens, however, that the matter of plausibility here is more complex than first appears.

As a start, it is simply not the case that settling in New Mexico would have been a sure way of escaping the Inquisition because the Inquisition was present in the colony almost from its inception. In the early 1620s, Fray Alonso de Benavides was elected custodian of the Franciscan missions in New Mexico and simultaneously appointed as the local commissary for the Inquisition in New Mexico, and Benavides took up residence in Santa Fe in 1626 in order to

discharge both roles (Scholes 1935). From this point forward, to the end of the colonial period, it was the practice of the Mexican Inquisition to make the highest-ranking Franciscan official in New Mexico their local commissary.

On the other hand, even though the Inquisition was present in New Mexico, what is also true is that Hispano settlement patterns would indeed have worked to the advantage of anyone seeking to escape Inquisitorial scrutiny. Thus, although the Law of the Indies may have required Spanish settlements in the Americas to be compact and concentrated around a central square, Hispano settlers in northern New Mexico consistently exhibited a predilection for dispersed settlement, which generally meant small ranchos scattered along the banks of the Rio Grande. Although this pattern of dispersed settlement made settlers more vulnerable to attack by nomadic Indians, it also meant that the day-to-day activities of the settlers were not observed by the local Franciscan missionaries living (for the most part) in the Pueblos. That dispersed settlement hindered surveillance of the Hispano settlers was not lost on the Franciscans. Writing in the late 1700s, Fray Juan Agustin de Morfi (1977:12) suggested that "since [the settlers ] do not live under the scrutiny of the authorities, it is not easy for the latter to keep track of the conduct of these subjects [and this] permits their larger crimes to go unpunished because they are not detected." And yet, while Hispano settlement patterns would have worked to the advantage of crypto-Jews anxious to escape the scrutiny of the Inquisition, another feature of life in colonial New Mexico would have made it an unappealing destination to crypto-Jews living in Mexico: the near-complete absence of mercantile activity.