Inquisitorial Inquiries Brief Lives of Secret Jews and Other Heretics

Edited and Translated by Richard L. Kagan and Abigail Dyer

Reviewed by David Freer

Truth or Dare

‘Truth is stranger than fiction’ goes the aphorism. Reading these six stories from Spain’s

Inquisition one begins to realize truth is a grey area that depends on your point of view

and whether the threat of torture accompanies the questions. The stories offer a

compelling look into the brutal Spanish Inquisition from the mouths of the accused.

Stopping to look at the individual trees in the forest offers a chance to focus on the unique

and macabre. History is not merely statistics or trends, Kagan’s book shines light on

amazing stories. The six stories were edited for brevity and clarity and following the

accounts an explanation by the editors is offered. The book lives up to its aims of putting

“something of a human face on the Inquisition.”

The Spanish inquisitors were consumed by religious passion that has changed

considerably; Catholics, while still believing they are the one true faith, are officially

tolerant of other faiths. Kagan and Dyer initially set the stage for the Holy Office of the

Inquisition (Santo Oficio de la Inquisición) before introducing the personal stories.

Surprisingly, heresy, it was believed, could be inherited!1 Inquisitors needed detailed

information to find other heretics. Thus their jobs were secure, souls were saved, and

God’s work was done on earth.

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Inquisitorial Inquiries Page 9
If the calificador gave the go-ahead, the trial commenced and evidence was presented.

After three initial audiencias the accused could be tortured in order to extract a

confession. Racks for stretching or hanging the accused did not “violate the (narrowly

construed) clerical injunction against spilling blood.”2 Throughout history men follow

the letter of the law, such as the Nazis or the slave-owners in America, while nonetheless

committing atrocities; perhaps the obedience to the ‘law’ clears the conscience from guilt.

The first story is about Abraham Abzaradiel aka Luis de la Ysla who left Spain to Italy

and Turkey and the Middle East. He became blind in Egypt and returned to his

homeland of Spain. His story illustrates that ‘globalization’ has been an overused

buzzword; Ysla’s early sixteenth century journeys were from a time before passports or

border guards. To me, Ysla’s story stands out, not only for the peripatetic wanderings of

his body but because of the related peripatetic wanderings of his soul. He changed

religions as people today would switch their allegiance to a different sports team in order

to better fit in and ingratiate themselves with the boss. This tentative religious affiliation,

however, was not out of the ordinary:

“Unstable religious identities of this sort were by no means unusual in the

sixteenth century: they can also be found on the frontiers between Catholicism
and Protestantism in western Europe as well as those separating Christianity and
indigenous beliefs in the New World.”

The truth of the story is difficult to tell3 but the mystery is an unavoidable part of history.

The second story about Elena/Eleno, the hermaphrodite with both sex natures who

married a man and a woman, left my jaw hanging open. Elena/o worked as a tailor, a

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page 17
3
page 36
surgeon and lived as a man and a woman. Explanations given to the Inquisition at first

seemed simplistic and laughable from a twenty-first century perspective, “I married first

as a woman to a man, then as a man to a woman, because when I married a man, the

feminine sex heated up and prevailed in me. Then, when my husband died, the masculine

sex heated up and I could marry a woman.”4 An introductory course in biology describes

animals which can change sex dependent on the environment (parrot fish) and animals

which contain both sexual organs (worms). People can be born as true hermaphrodites

but the idea that sexual intimacy or the loss of intimacy will lead to changing natures

seems doubtful. Perhaps the answer is not that there are two discrete sexes but a

continuum of sexuality and some individuals are born neither male nor female.5

Physicians were puzzled by the dual nature and her story that she recently lost her penis

remains unverifiable, although a brilliant legal strategy.

Next is the story of the soldier-prophet Piedrola. His prophecies were feared by the

clerics of the time, according to him. “The clerics were amazed and wondered if

Pidrola’s knowledge was diabolical.”6 He recanted his abilities by the end of his

confession and was given a “light sentence” of five years in prison and forbade him from

reading the Bible or speaking of religious matters. By doing this the Inquisition silenced

Piedrola’s voice but was he allowed to receive the sacraments after his prison term?

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page 47
5
http://hermaphrodite.arriba.net/ This hermaphrodite offers an interesting perspective on life
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page 75