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LEÓN, Spain (JTA) — It’s the week earlier than Easter in León, an historical metropolis in northwest Spain, and locals have poured into the streets to knock again glasses of wine-lemonade, an annual festivity that’s typically punctuated with a cheerful cry: “Matar judíos,” or “Kill Jews.”
“Semana Santa,” or Holy Week, is an important non secular interval in Spain. León’s celebrations are significantly spectacular, marked by 10 days of music, sermons and about 30 processions, that includes some 16,000 penitents. It’s additionally a excessive season for guests — in 2002, the town’s Holy Week was declared a “Competition of Worldwide Curiosity for Vacationers.”
One fixture of those frenzied days is a Leonese cocktail produced from purple wine, lemons, cinnamon and sugar, typically with oranges and figs. Right here it’s known as “limonada,” and nearly each bar in Barrio Húmedo, the town’s nightlife-packed medieval quarter, is plastered with indicators promoting their model. It’s native custom to drink 33 limonadas throughout Holy Week, representing the age of Jesus when he was crucified.
It’s additionally a centuries-old custom for revelers searching for limonadas to say they’re going out to “kill Jews.”
“It’s an expression right here,” Margarita Torres Sevilla, a professor of medieval historical past on the College of León, informed the Jewish Telegraphic Company. “For instance, you inform me, ‘Have a drink with me? Okay, let’s go kill Jews.’ One other typical sentence of Holy Week is, ‘What number of Jews have you ever killed? Three, 4, 5 [limonadas]? Oh, you have got killed quite a bit.’”
In León, a metropolis of about 124,000 that has no seen Jewish neighborhood, locals informed JTA the phrase isn’t seen as vulgar or antisemitic. Some bars have fun it as a degree of satisfaction within the metropolis’s heritage, utilizing the phrase as a hashtag when promoting their seasonal specials on social media.
“With the arrival of Holy Week additionally comes the season of Leonese limonada, a practice that’s popularly often known as ‘killing Jews,’” mentioned a Spanish-language Fb publish from Bar Genarín on March 10. “We give you two varieties, the traditional and a white.”
“It’s unusual to foreigners, however they take it with fun,” mentioned Sonia Da Costa, a server dashing plates and glasses to the swell of shoppers at Cafetería Chamberí, a neighborhood tapas bar. “Right here it’s regular.”
The historic Jewish quarter of León, which has not seen a Jewish inhabitants in a whole bunch of years, includes two streets embedded within the very Barrio Húmedo overflowing with limonadas at present. Few traces point out the place the neighborhood lived; its three medieval synagogues have been misplaced, the ultimate one commemorated by a small plaque lately put in on Misericordia Avenue: “The third Jewish synagogue of León was constructed right here (1370-1481).” On a aspect avenue branching off León’s central sq., one stone doorway bears two vertical markings, which Torres Sevilla believes have been left by a mezuzah.
One among León’s historic synagogues is marked with a plaque. There aren’t any Jews dwelling in León at present. (Shira Li Bartov)
Jews settled within the space beginning within the tenth century. León produced Moses de León, a famed Jewish mystic, and have become a middle of Jewish non secular thought. Jews lived in relative equality to León’s Christians, interrupted by sporadic spurts of violence, till 1293, when King Sancho IV banned them from proudly owning farmland. 20 years later Jews have been compelled to put on a yellow badge, and beginning in 1365 they needed to pay a particular tax, much like one borne by Muslims.
The expression of “killing Jews” on Holy Week goes again to an episode within the fifteenth century, in keeping with Torres Sevilla. León was economically devastated by struggle and the Black Demise, leaving many Christian noblemen in debt. One such knight, Suero de Quiñones, owed funds to a Jewish service provider. To keep away from paying his debt, Quiñones whipped up a non secular fervor towards León’s Jews on Holy Week in 1449. He organized a bunch of knights to assault the Jewish quarter, murdering the lender and several other others on Good Friday.
“Quiñones mentioned on Holy Week, our Lord was accused by the Jews and the Jews killed him,” mentioned Torres Sevilla. “So what can we do with the Jews? Kill them. However the true motive was not a Christian motive — the true motive was that he had an necessary debt to an necessary service provider of the Jewish neighborhood.”
To have fun their supposed vengeance for the demise of Jesus, Quiñones and his allies went to drink wine in Barrio Húmedo. Thus commenced the ritual of downing limonadas to the chorus of “killing Jews,” mentioned Torres Sevilla.
Different tales say the phrase emerged from the taming powers of limonada, licensed by medieval leaders within the midst of Holy Week’s abstinence and fasting to cease Christians from committing pogroms towards Jews — by conserving them occupied within the taverns.
Processions reenacting the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus are a centerpiece of Holy Week in León, Spain. (Shira Li Bartov)
(The Leonese custom of “Matar judíos” doesn’t look like linked to the Spanish city about 150 kilometers east that was known as Castrillo Matajudíos — or Fort Kill the Jews — from 1627, throughout a interval of antisemitic persecution, till a couple of years in the past.)
The area’s Jewish neighborhood didn’t final lengthy after Quiñones’s assault. Jews have been expelled from León in 1481, and 11 years later, below the Alhambra Decree of King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella I, from all of Spain. Some historians have additionally linked limonada’s affiliation with “killing Jews” to a quote attributed to Ferdinand, upon signing the expulsion decree in 1492: “Limonada que trasiego, judío que pulverizo” (“Limonada that I decant, Jew that I pulverize”).
In the present day, residents say the phrase is a social customized devoid of any connection to homicide, faith or real-life Jews.
“Individuals are used to it right here, it’s an expression that isn’t racist in any respect,” mentioned José Manuel, who works at Vychio Cafe Bar. “It’s an expression from a time interval of racism however now, no, it’s an expression out of customized.”
Torres Sevilla mentioned {that a} Jewish previous lies dormant in León, even inside locals who could not know their very own historical past. Whereas tens of 1000’s of Jews fled Spain on account of the Alhambra Decree, 1000’s others stayed and transformed. Torres Sevilla believes she is among the many Spaniards descended from “conversos,” who preserved some distinct traditions regardless of changing into Christian. “Sevilla” is a traditionally Jewish surname. Her household goes to church on Saturday — not Sunday — and begins prayers on Friday, the Jewish Shabbat. She grew up with a ritual, additionally present in different “converso” households, of cleansing the house and having clear garments prepared earlier than Saturday.
Many Leonese Jews stayed and transformed after 1492, she mentioned, however their descendants could do not know — and will even be amongst these calling to “kill Jews” with their limonadas on Holy Week.
“Everyone is aware of about ‘kill Jews,’ however no person is aware of concerning the Jewish historical past of León,” mentioned Torres Sevilla.
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