A-Z OF JEWISH VALUES -

L FOR LOVE & LOYALTY

Reyna Nasi & Ruth HaMoavi (Shavuot)

One of the themes of Shavuot is love and marriage. Israel is wedded to the Eternal, and Torah embodies the contractual agreement solemnising the bond.

The story of Ruth reflects several aspects of the festival including this one. Its message is that of Love and Loyalty. Loyalty to Ruth’s widowed mother-in-law. Love between her and Naomi’s kinsman Boaz, leading eventually to their marriage. And the Loving-kindness, which Boaz shows Ruth when she first appears on the scene as a widow herself, a destitute refugee, a stranger, a foreigner, by fulfilling the mitzvah of allowing her to glean the leftovers of the harvest of his field as the Torah commands should be done for those who live on the fringes of society.

There are fascinating comparisons and contrast between this story and a piece of Jewish history which has become very much neglected. It’s the life-story of one of the most powerful and influential Jewish women who ever lived. Doña Gracia Mendez Nasi and her daughter Reyna. Gracia Mendez was born of one of the Marrano families expelled from Spain at the end of the 15^th century. Like Naomi she was widowed. (Mendez was her husband’s name. Nasi meaning Prince was indicative of the fact that they had noble Jewish lineage going back to important leaders.). Her husband died aged 40 leaving her in charge of his business which combined trade in spices and jewellery. She went into partnership with her brother in law, a banker, who also died. Wealth and wisdom combined in her to make her a most capable businesswoman. She was also most loyal to Judaism, and wanted to use her powers to save her persecuted fellow Marranos, secret Jews. Not being in apposition to do that in Portugal where the Inquisition was strong she emigrated, first to London for a brief while then to Antwerp, centre of the diamond trade.

There she used her influences to rescue many Marranos.

But there too her daughter Reyna became the subject of amorous advances from a Spanish Catholic aristocrat called Francisco de Arragon. He used his connections with royalty (Charles V of Austria and Spain no less) to try to win her hand in marriage. Together they were offering 200,000 gold ducats for her. Quite a handsome transfer fee. Her mother was against the union. Still not daring to reveal her Jewish identity, she used as her pretext that the man was too old for her daughter. Her tactic was that her daughter was after all only 14 years of age, and he was 60! This did not wash with her suitor, or his royal protectors. One suspects that there was something other than love that motivated him. There was only one solution available and that was to pack up all they could and all that was of transportable value and leave, in secret.

They found their way to Italy – mother, daughter, sister and a nephew. They settled in Venice – outside the Ghetto, set up home, and the business. Gracia became an eminent Jewish woman Merchant of Venice.

Then trouble struck. Her sister fell out with her over a financial squabble, and had her denounced to the spies of the Inquisition. She was flung in jail and her assets were frozen – to the delight of her debtors– which included the King of France no less.

She was bailed out of jail by the Sultan of Turkey, none other the Suleiman the Magnificent (the very same who built the walls of Jerusalem). Suleiman valued his commercial investments with her. He was no friend of the Venetians but was a friend of the Jews. She left again first for Ferrara and then for Constantinople, finally free enough to throw off the cloak of Marranism and nail her colours to the mast as a proud daughter of Israel.

There she was able to help her people as never before. When the Pope had a 100 Jews condemned to the stake in Ancona she had the port boycotted and saved three-quarters of them.

She became not only an important champion of freedom for her people but also a patron (or matron) of Jewish scholarship. Jewish scholars dedicated their books to her. Her nephew, Joseph Nasi, also rose to favour at court. The Sultan made him a present of a handful of Greek Islands and appointed him Duke of Naxos. But his greatest gift of all was the hand of his cousin Reyna in marriage. Like Ruth haMoavi, Reyna Nasi married a relative. Like her she was a refugee made good. Ruth adopted the faith of her mother in law. Reyna returned to the faith of her mother. Ruth emigrated to Israel – Reyna’s husband wasn’t satisfied with Greek islands. Naxos was so near and yet so far from where he wanted to be. He asked the Turkish rulers for a settlement in Israel, and he was granted Tiberias.

When Jerusalem was desecrated and banned to Jews by the Romans, Tiberias took over. There the Palestinian Talmud was composed. It was there that the Massoretes had invented the system of vowels, chanting notes and punctuation to help with the reading of Hebrew. Joseph Nasi pioneered a settlement there for the first time in over 10 centuries. He planted mulberry trees to established a silk industry. Silk was the luxury textile of the period. His aunt-cum-mother-in-law had synagogues and yeshivahs instituted there. And Marranos were brought there by the shipload. (The family’s own ships.)

There is a wonderful museum in Tiberias which celebrates Gracia Mendez Nasi and her family which I discovered to my surprise the other week, having been teaching the story in Cheder. They have set out the place with rooms containing furniture from the countries Gracia lived in, very anachronistic about the furniture, but nevertheless creating a beautiful atmosphere, and telling the family story with the most exquisite doll models in glass cases.

[The building itself is interesting. It was originally part of a commercial district with shops and offices, called unimaginatively the Terminal Building, the investor in it lost a lot of money, and sold it to a family who decided to turn it into a hotel for Christian tourists on pilgrimage. They looked for a name and decided on Dona Gracia (the name of one of the streets) because it sounded Christian! As a result of the Intifada tourism plummeted as everywhere in Israel. An Iraqi Jew called Zvi Shayek who owned the largest tourism business in Israel decided to make something of it using the life history of the woman after whom it had been named. He went all over Europe and Turkey buying artefacts to tell her story]

Our knowledge of what happened to the family is a bit hazy, it fades out toward the end through the lack of documentary and concrete evidence. We know that the matriarch Gracia wanted to build a mansion in Tiberias by the hot springs there, which did not come to fruition. It is not known whether or not she ended her days there. Likewise the Duke and Duchess of Naxos. We know they had a daughter who died age 10.

The settlement in Tiberias too was ill-fated. The silk-industry never took off. A few Jewish families continued to live there. There was a synagogue called La Señora after Gracia Nasi. It wasn’t until the 19^th century that a Jewish community became established there.

So many of the values we celebrate on Shavuot are embraced by this story.

Love and Loyalty – the refusal of a marriage into the aristocracy at a period when it was not uncommon for Jews to save their skins by such prestigious intermarriage. Dona Gracia’s refusal might be considered remarkable seen from the vantage point of our Hello Magazine culture. For Ruth it was conversion to the faith of Israel for the sake of family loyalty, for the Nasi family it was a return to Judaism.

The value of saving Jews for Judaism- the promotion of Torah learning culture, this is all what Shavuot stands for.

And the Exodus theme, being refugees from one country to another – in Ruth and Naomi’s case the escape from poverty and illness. And the lovingkindness shown to the widow, the poor and the stranger – Ruth was all three. For the Nasi family it was using your wealth to help your needy kinfolk.

Even the agricultural elements are in both stories, the barley harvest in Ruth, the mulberry bushes in Reyna Nasi.

And the down-to-earth truth that to keep Jewish life going there needs to be a good solid base of economics as well as a sound spirituality and faith.

As much as we learn from the Torah, so we learn from the heroic examples of the men and women of our history who gave their all to uphold it.