The Hebrew Bible, Jewish Tradition and the Rede nition of Catholicism in the Sixteenth Century

Abstract

The aim of this work is to show the role of Hebrew language, as the language of some parts of the Bible, in the shaping of the Catholic identity in Spain during the 16th century. This is a period of change in the Spanish society, after the Jews being expelled in 1492 and trying the assimilation –dissolution– of the converts. The Hebrew language and its exegetical texts are placed in the middle of the confrontation between two schools of thought: on the one side, there were thinkers aiming at protecting Christendom from the Jew influence; on the other side, some theologians, most of them of convert origins, praise Hebrew language and its traditions as the best way to understand the Old Testament and, therefore, as an important part of Christian identity. Thus, this work hopes to contribute to the analysis of the ideological aspects involved in the controversy after the Council of Trent.