Abner of Burgos, Converso

Abner of Burgos (c.1270 – c.1347) converted to Christianity from Judaism around 1320, taking on the name Alfonso of Valladolid or "Master Alfonso." He was well into adulthood, so his conversion was not a rebellion against his parents' culture, nor was it a young man's quest for something "different," nor was it forced upon him by an oppressive Christian government. So what happened?

The Jewish belief in a messiah gave rise to many claims over the centuries that he was imminent. In Avila, in central Spain, a Jew named Nissim ben Abraham actively preached that the messiah would appear in 1295 on the last day of the month of Tammuz (which can fall in late June or early July). Nissim was said to be a simple man who was inspired by an angel and wrote a mystic work, "The Wonder of Wisdom."

Many were convinced by Nissim, and they eagerly awaited the messiah. Like predictions of the Second Coming or of the End of the World, no messiah appeared. What they experienced, however, was a rain of crosses that stuck to their clothing (so they described to Abner). The disappointment and depression that followed among Nissim's adherents was profound.

Abner, a scholar of the Bible and the Talmud as well as a doctor, found himself being turned to by these disappointed people, treating them and trying to assuage their grief. Curiously, his discussions with these people about the lack of a messiah and their report of the appearance of the Christian symbol made him think "outside the box" about Judaism and its promises.

In a post-conversion work by Abner, Moreh tsedeḳ ("Teacher of righteousness"), he described how some 25 years after Avila he had a dream/revelation of a man who told him to become a "teacher of righteousness." About three years later he had the same dream, but this time noticed that the man had crosses on his clothes. This was his tipping point: he chose to embrace Christianity. He became a Neo-Platonic Christian and wrote treatises against Judaism. He believed that his version of Christianity was superior to others' and to Judaism. He preached that conversion to Christianity was the only way for Jews to get out of their perpetual Exile.

He was appointed sacristan of the collegiate church of Valladolid. This made some Jews accuse him of converting for material gain. What they did not understand, however, was that a sacristan was far from a lucrative position. He wrote extensive works (not all extant, or available in English) supporting conversion of Jews. He also debated rabbis. His arguments to King Alfonso XI of Castile that a Jewish prayer, the Birkat haMinim, blasphemed the Christian God and cursed Christians, led to the prayers being declared forbidden as off February 1336. The Birkat declares a curse on all heretics (so he had an ironic point, I guess).

We have his works, but no record of his death. 1347 was the last known record of him publishing. It is possible that he was a victim of the Black Death.

There were a few claims of a Jewish Messiah in the Middle Ages (and earlier and later). We'll look at some of them tomorrow.

The Christian Kabbalah

Scholars and philosophers of the later Middle Ages became interested in the mysticism found in the Jewish Kabbalah and tried to blend it with Christian concepts of the divine.

Ramon Llull (c.1232–1316), who also wrote of worldly affairs like knighthood, was one of the first known Christians to look at Kabbalah, although his study of it was mostly to develop ways to debate Jews and influence conversion to Christianity. His interest got him in trouble because the concepts he was talking about attracted the attention of the Inquisition.

The conversion of Spanish Jews did bring Kabbalistic concepts to Christian theology, especially in Spain prior to 1492. One prominent converso was Abner of Burgos (c.1270 – c.1347), a Bible and Talmud scholar who had a dream of crosses after he developed religious doubts because of a failed Messianic movement in 1295. He embraced and used Jewish sources to try to prove the validity of Christianity.

Another converso was Pablo/Paulus de Heredia (c.1405), who wrote an "Epistle of Secrets" which is considered the first true work of Christian Kabbalah. Not the scholar that Abner was, Pablo's work misquotes Kabbalah sources and "quotes" sources that are non-existent.

A Christian who adopted Kabbalistic ideas was Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463–1494), a student of Marsilius Ficino. (The illustration shows Pico in the center with Ficino in red next to him.) Kabbalah was introduced to him by another tutor, Rabbi Johanan Alemanno, whose idea was that the study of magic was the ultimate goal and expression of intellectual and spiritual mastery. Pico became convinced that the Kabbalah was necessary to understand the world and the divine, and had a Jewish convert translate the entire body of kabbalistic literature into Latin for him (now being published in its entirety). Pico's "900 Theses" became a foundation of Western esotericism.

So how exactly does a lifelong Jew decide to convert to Christianity (I mean, when not being forced)? Let's examine Abner of Burgos' personal journey tomorrow, and whether he did it for financial gain.