Was Christopher Columbus a Jew? Maybe.

Today I am just plain sick and tired of the crap that is flowing from the bung holes on both sides of the aisle.  Democrat and Republican, all while the midget in North Korea is testing his nuclear weapons while Iran President Ahamdinejad is sitting close happily jerking each other off while playing with their Tapo Dongs.

I managed to dig up some articles that explore whether or not Christopher Columbus was a Jew.  Read the evidence and decide for yourself.  Just a little something to make you think.

There has always been an historic molehill waiting to become a mountain,
and that is the question of whether Columbus himself was Jewish.
Although there has never been any serious evidence for the notion, many
historians have touched upon the subject. It was taken up by Vignaud in
1913, Fransisco Martinez in 1916, Jacob Wasserman in 1929, and became
the pretext for a biography by Madariaga in 1939. Despite the lack of
evidence, the suggestion resurfaced in a book by the famous Nazi-hunter
Simon Wiesenthal in 1972 (Sails of Hope). Although there was no doubt
that he was a Catholic, he came from, and was most likely born in,
Genoa. His parents were a “New Christian” family which, in the 15th
century, often meant Previously-Jewish, and most likely of Spanish
extraction.
Rumors have abounded for years that Christopher Columbus was a secret practicing Jew, commonly know as an “onosim, ” literally, “forced” since they were forced to hide their Judaism at the risk of death from the Inquisition.  (The traditional term “Merrano” is being phased out because it means “pig.”)

Tomas de Torquemada was appointed inquisitor-general of the Inquisition in 1483. In 12 years, the Inquisition condemned 13,000 Marranos, men and women who had continued to practice Judaism in secret. They were tortured in La Casas Santa, the Holy Houses, and burned alive at the stake with their property being divided between the Pope and the King.

Following the fall of the arab stronghold of Granada on January 2, 1492, there was a renewed impetus to remove Jews from Spain. On March 31, 1492, the Edit of Expulsion was signed. The deadline for Jews to leave Spain was August 3, 1492. Columbus and his crew boarded their vessels before midnight, and on the August 3rd sailed before sunrise.

Some historians have claimed that Christopher Columbus was a converso (a Spanish Jew who publicly converted to Christianity). The correlation between the Alhambra decree, which called for the expulsion of all of the Jews from Spain and its territories and possessions by July 31, 1492, and Columbus’ embarkation on his first voyage on August 3, 1492, has been offered as support for this claim.

The historian Salvador de Madariaga believed that Columbus was from a Catalan family who fled to Genoa to escape persecution for being Jewish.

Columbus in his will bequeathed “one-half mark of silver” to “a Jew who lived at the entrance to the Jewish Quarter in Lisbon,” a deathbed affirmation, perhaps, of ties to the Jewish community that were never evident in Columbus’s life.Or merely recognising an old friend.

The evidence that Columbus was a secretly practicing Jews is substantial:

• He began his voyage to the New World on Tisha B’Av, 1492- the same day of the forced expulsion of the Jews from Spain.
• Columbus was not his real name. In his lifetime, he was known as Colon, a common Jewish name. For example, a leading 15th century Italian rabbi was Joseph Colon (1420-1480).
• There appears to be the Hebrew letters beis hay in the corner of his writings, a common device still used today, meaning “b’ezras Hashem” or “with the help of G-d.”
• On one occasion, Columbus records date according to the Jewish calender.
• He made numerous references to Jewish concerning, even referring the second Temple as the “Second House,” a direct translation of Hebrew.

Many claim, however, that the letters in the corner of his writings are not Hebrew, but something else illegible. As for his Jewish references, any navigating Christian might be aware of the Jewish calendar and the Second Temple. Furthermore, Columbus never uses Hebrew in any of his letters, and never showed signs of insincerity in his Christian faith. 

The centuries old debate whether the explorer of the Pinta, Nina, and Santa Maria was a Jew or not seemed to resolve with the help a cable TV network. 

In 2004, the Discovery Channel attempted to settle this matter once and for all. Professor Charles Merrill, who has studied Columbus for years, and a group of scientists traveled to Seville, Spain. There, they met with Anunciada Colon, a direct descendent of Columbus, who handed them the keys to the chest that is reported to hold the bones of Columbus’ along with those of his brother Diego and son Hernando. All three were exhumed for a series of complex DNA tests.  Professor Merrill managed to find Y chromosome in Columbus’ DNA and through it, Columbus’s genetic makeup, concluding that Columbus was not Jewish. They are keeping his remains in storage in case future advances in genetic testing will be able to further the research.

Professor Merrill was later asked the significance of the Y chromosome disproving Columbus’ Jewishness, since in only proved his father wasn’t Jewish. When asked about the possibility of Columbus’ mother being Jewish, making him a Jew as well, professor Merrill replied “I think he may well have been descended from Jews on at least his mother’s side (if he was related to the Cavalleria family, for instance), but we have no proof whatsoever of that.”

This would seem to support  Columbus’ Jewishness, but there’s still one problem-they may have gotten the wrong guy. Although the test was done in Spain, the Dominican Republic also claims to have his bones. Poor Chris’ bones were moved so many times they may have been inadvertently misplaced along the way.

If Columbus himself was not Jewish, he did have some Jewish help on board….

Luis De Torres was engaged by Columbus as the linguist for the fleet of
three ships, the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria. The man was
supposedly fluent in Arabic, Hebrew, Chaldean, Spanish, Portuguese,
French and Latin. He was a Marano, a “damned” or secret Jew who, to
escape persecution, and death at the hands of the inquisition, converted
to Christianity but, at heart, remained Jewish. He had served a Juan
Chacon, Governor of Murcia, as Hebrew interpreter, Murcia having a large
Jewish population; but with the forthcoming expulsion he would no longer
be required. He was converted from Judaism to Catholicism on August 2nd
1492, so timed to enable him to join the fleet which set sail the very
next day. August 3rd was also an historic day, not only from the
standpoint of the fleet sailing out from Palos, but this was also the
day that Ferdinand and Isabella signed the order of expulsion of all
Jews from the Iberian Peninsula who had not embraced Catholicism; it was
also Tisha B’av.  Was it merely coincidental that the three ships on
that very day raised their anchors to set sail for the “”New World”?

At that time there was certainly an awareness of positive Jewish
contribution to the events. Jews figured prominently in the study of
navigational skills such as astronomy and cartography. An Abraham Zacuto
invented the Astrolobe, an instrument which enabled Vasco Da Gama to
reach the Cape of Good Hope. With respect to the Columbus voyage,
naturally there could be no Jewish crew as such, but there were
certainly maranos, amongst them the ship’s surgeon, the navigator and
the cartographer. Finally there was Luis De Torres.

How Columbus, an experienced sailor, but from humble Italian beginnings,
convinced Spanish royalty to sponsor the venture is another story.
Basically, he had been negotiating for about ten years with very little
success. Finally, a Luis De Santangel, keeper of the privy purse
(chancellor of the Exchequer) made the argument that since a successful
trip would only cost a Title, and that Columbus would be paid on
commission, it should go ahead. Ferdinand and Isabella were finally
convinced. In fact, had they not been, Santangel himself had offered to
finance the whole voyage himself; he was a Marano, and it is ironic
perhaps that without the help of a converted Jew the voyage would not
have taken place.