Capitán Luis José Carvajal Rodríguez de Matos

Luis de Carvajal el Mozo (Benavente [Zamora] - Ciudad de México, 8 de diciembre de 1596) fue un comerciante y poeta novohispano , destacado miembro de la reducida comunidad de marranos (denominación que se empleaba para los cristianos nuevos de los que se sospechaba que «judaizaban», es decir, que mantenían prácticas de la religión judía) que consiguieron establecerse en América durante la colonización española. Se le considera el primer escritor judío de América.

Era castellano de nacimiento, hijo de Francisco Rodríguez de Matos y Francisca de Carvajal y sobrino de Luis de Carvajal y de la Cueva (cristianos nuevos de origen portugués). Utilizaba el apellido de su madre, viuda (también aparece escrito como "Núñez de Carvajal" y con la forma "Carabajal"). Para distinguirle de su tío se le añadía el sobrenombre de "el Mozo". En los documentos aparece siempre como soltero. Se identificaba profesionalmente como tratante.1 Pasó con su familia al Nuevo Mundo, donde tuvieron un importante papel en la fundación de Monterrey. Su tío era el gobernador del Nuevo Reino de León.

Procesado por la Inquisición, fue reconciliado el 24 de febrero de 1590, siendo condenado a prisión perpetua en el hospital de lunáticos de San Hipólito, en la capital mexicana. El 9 de febrero de 1595 fue vuelto a procesar por relapso; durante la tortura, según los registros judiciales, testificó contra su madre y hermanas. En una de las sesiones de su juicio (la del 25 de febrero) se le mostró un libro manuscrito autobiográfico, que reconoció como suyo, que comenzaba con las palabras "En el nombre del Señor de los Ejércitos", traducción castellana de la invocación hebrea be shem Adonay Zebaot. El 8 de febrero de 1596 fue puesto al fuego en la parrilla desde las nueve y media de la mañana hasta las dos de la tarde; durante la tortura denunció al menos a 121 personas, aunque posteriormente se retractó de esa confesión. Para evitar nuevas torturas se arrojó por una ventana. Murió quemado en la hoguera diez meses después, en un auto de fe posterior, el 8 de diciembre de 1596.2

Junto con su hermano Baltasar de Carvajal compuso himnos y endechas para fiestas judías, uno de ellos, una clase de widdui (confesión de pecados) en forma de soneto, se reproduce en El libro rojo (1870) del escritor mexicano Vicente Riva Palacio (1832-1896).

En los documentos de su segundo proceso, además de como poeta, aparece como un gran latinista, erudito de las Escrituras, y fervoroso creyente de la religión judía; incluso místico o iluminado. Cambió su nombre por el de José Lumbroso.3

Referencias[editar · editar código]

Este artículo contiene fragmentos pertenecientes a la Jewish Encyclopedia de 1901-1906(artículo « Carabajal » por Cyrus Adler and George Alexander Kohut), una obra que se encuentra ya en el dominio público. Vicente Riva Palacio, El Libro Rojo, México, 1870. C.K. Landis, Carabajal the Jew, a Legend of Monterey, Vineland, N. J., 1894. Notas[editar · editar código]

Ir a ↑ Eugenio del Hoyo: Historia del Nuevo Reino de León (1577-1723), pág. 575. Ir a ↑ Los criptojudíos: el lado oscuro de la sociedad novohispana», artículo de Liz Hamui Sutton en el sitio web Ramat México. Ir a ↑ Eugenio del Hoyo op. cit. pg. 210. Categorías: Nacidos en año desconocidoFallecidos en 1596Cristianos nuevosVíctimas de la InquisiciónEscritores judíosTorturadosJudíos de MéxicoEjecutados en la hoguera

Please refer to [http://books.google.by/books? id=WJomArXZsxYC&pg=PA29&lpg=PA29&dq=Antonio+de+Carvajal+conquistador&source=bl&ots=INt8YkShN2&sig=zKrPQwca6YM1G6kYVZUexRJa1ko&hl=en&sa=X&ei=ROeyUuiLFoWjhgfmnIDAAw&ved=0CGEQ6AEwCw#v=onepage&q&f=false The Martyr Luis de Carvajal: A Secret Jew in Sixteenth-century Mexico by Martin A. Cohen] for details on his life.

From the moment of his birth in the summer of 1566 through the spring and summer of 1579, young Luis had no contact with Jews. His knowledge of Judaism was minimal, confined to hearsay and personal deductions reached from his own superficial exposure to the Bible. Like everyone else in Spain in the middle of the 16th century, Luis was a Christian. The Jews had been expelled by a rescript issued by the Catholic Sovereigns, Ferdinand and Isabella, in 1492, six and a half months before Columbus discovered America. Ten years later, a similar edict summarily removed the remaining Moors from Spanish soil. Spain was left a Christian nation. And when its leadership stifled the frequent and often cogent voices of Protestantism resound within its borders through the early decades of the 16th century, Spain became a nation in which every man, woman, and child belonged to the Church of Rome. [4]

Luis was born a Catholic, the son of Francisco Rodriguez de Matos and Francisca de Carvajal, both respected members of the church. The boy's name originally had been Luis Rodriguez, or following the Spanish custom of using both the patronymic and matronymic, Luis Rodriguez Carvajal. This was later changed to Luis de Carvajal.

Luis Rodriguez Carvajal was baptized and scrupulously reared in the Catholic faith [5]. His home and upbringing left him not the slightest room to doubt his parents' unswerving Catholic piety and devotion. In the comfrot of his home in Benavente, Luis received his elementary education, "learning... reading, writing, and arithmetic," as he rather unoriginally summed it up. Like his brothers and sisters, he was certainly also adequately exposed to the rudimentary responsibilities of belief and practice imposed by the church, learning the Lord's Prayer, the credo, the Hail Mary, the Hail Holy Queen, and the general confession in Latin [6]. Not until his family moved to Medina del Campo did he change from tutorial to more formal education, and this change too appeared to bespeak his parents' Catholic zeal. Shortly after their arrival in Medina del Campo, they enrolled their son in the Jesuit school of that city. There young Luis went through at least two of the grades of traditional Jesuitic study, the first concentrating on Latin grammar, and the second on rhetoric, or as it was sometimes called, "humanities", with readings from Virgil, Cicero, and other Latin writers. There is no mention of his having proceeded further to the study of dialectics, aimed at opening a student's mind to opposing arguments and helping him resolve them by the use of medieval scholastic techniques [7].

Only an accident of history linked Luis Rodriguez Carvajal to Judaism and the Jews. It was simply the fact, as yet unknown to him, that his ancestors had included Jews. And to Spanish Catholics in the middle of the 16th century, the question of whether or not they had Jewish ancestors made all the difference in the world.

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Born and raised in Spain, close to the border of Portugal, Luis could not have failed to know the plight of the New Christians (conversos), especially the Portuguese. Yet, sensitive and perceptive though Luis was, there is every reason to doubt his ever having entertained suspicions that he was a Portuguese New Christian descended from Jews.

He was aware, to be sure, that his ancestry stemmed largely from Portugal (a refuge, for a time, for Spanish Jews fleeing the rest of the peninsula). His father, Francisco Rodriguez, had a surname frequently used by New Christians in Portugal as well as Spain. Yet this fact was insufficient to impel anyone to the conclusion that he had Jewish forebears. His father's matronymic, de Matos, was unquestionably Portuguese.

Luis had never seen any of his paternal relatives. Some of them, including his father's parents, were not even known to him by name. Of two brothers of his father, he could say only that he had been told that one uncle, Diego Rodriguez, was living somewhere in Portugal, and the other, Hernan Rodriguez, died in the town of Puebla in New Spain.

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Notes for CAPTAIN LUIS DE CARVAJAL, THE YOUNGER: A.K.A. Luis Rodriguez de Matos, Luis Rodriguez Cavajal, and Josef Lumbroso.

http://www.villadan.com/webcards/ps12/ps12_492.htm

The coat of arms of Nuevo León is made up of four squares that form of a cross. Above, six bees represent the hard-working nature of local inhabitants. In the upper left section is the Sun next to La Silla Hill and, in the foreground, an orange. In the upper right-hand square is a crowned lion ready to attack. ...In the lower part of the coat of arms is the motto Sempre Ascendens, which means rising up in search of the best. In 1582, the King of Spain, Felipe II, granted Luis Carvajal y de la Cueva authorization to colonize these lands.

Introduction to inquisition trial transcripts and records . . . . In theory, all stages of a formal trial by inquisition should have been diligently recorded and carefully archived for future reference. Countless folios of parchment and paper were undoubtedly filled by scribes from the very earliest days of inquisitorial activity; yet few early exemplars have survived.

. . . More or less complete trial transcripts have been identified, published and studied at length in many instances:

The spectacular cases of archbishop Carranza (1559-1576), cardinal Morone (1552-1559) or Galileo Galilei (1633) are well known, but even those of lesser figures such as the Mexican crypto-Jew Luis de Carvajal and his family (1589-1596) have found their audience.