Jorge Puello Speaks - 4

Message 4, February 18, 2010, 5:01:54PM

Yoram has left a new comment on your post "WHO IS JORGE PUELLO, PT 2: JUMPING DOWN THE RABBIT...":

<<>> [יִרְמְיָה, Yirmĭyahu. 31:37]


<<>> [סנהדרין‎-Sanhedrin 44a]

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<< (According to Kings 19:18, there were 7,000 faithful Israelites who) “have not bowed to Baal, we did not see that it occurred to any of our Sages that our forefathers who betrayed God, rebelled against Him and denied Him should be called ‘complete gentiles’ or ‘worse than gentiles,’ and that their sons who repented and worshipped God should be considered proselytes >> [R. She’ adyá ben Maimon ibn Danan, Khemdah Genuzah, 15a]

In views of Divine, Prophetic, Talmudic and post-Talmudic understanding, an apostate Israelite is still an Israelite. It follows that an Anous, who was forced into avoda zara / foreign cult, and their children who are born in a state of duress among non-Jews, are also Israelites:

<< (the children of Anusim), who have never seen the light of the Torah, are no different from Jewish children who have lived as prisoners among non-Jews or with Karaites (Israelites who do not believe in the authority of Oral Torah), even Maimuni, Hiljot, Mamrim III, 3, had compassion on them, and treated them lightly. >> [R. Abraham de Aboab – year 1694 -- Deber Shemuel, No. 45(S. 18c f.)]

It hardly ever occurred to the Sages of Israel in the Ottoman Empire, Italy, Algiers, Morocco, Amsterdam, London – in fact every where the most brilliant luminaries of our tradition flourished – to call Anusim “gentiles” much less “proselytes”. Because, as received in the mouth of Rabbi Samuel de Medina from his teacher R. Taytazak, as confirmed by Gaon Zemah, in relation to the Anusim: