Editing Sephardic Jews (section)

=== Sephardic Bnei Anusim ===
{{main|Sephardic Bnei Anusim}}
{{See also|Converso|New Christian}}
The [[Sephardic Bnei Anusim]] consists of the contemporary and largely nominal [[Christianity|Christian]] descendants of assimilated 15th century Sephardic [[anusim]]. These descendants of Spanish and Portuguese [[Jew]]s forced or coerced to convert to [[Catholicism]] remained, as [[conversos]], in [[Iberia]] or moved to the [[Ibero-America|Iberian colonial possessions]] across various [[Latin America]]n countries during the [[Spanish colonization of the Americas]].

Due to historical reasons and circumstances, Sephardic Bnei Anusim had not been able to return to the [[Judaism|Jewish faith]] over the last five centuries,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.netanya.ac.il/englishSite/Centers/SecretJewsCenter/Publications/Documents/beloved-legacy.pdf |title=Beloved legacy |website=www.netanya.ac.il |access-date=22 July 2014 |archive-date=8 August 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140808190821/http://www.netanya.ac.il/englishSite/Centers/SecretJewsCenter/Publications/Documents/beloved-legacy.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> although increasing numbers have begun emerging publicly in modern times, especially over the last two decades. Except for varying degrees of putatively rudimentary Jewish customs and traditions which had been retained as [[family traditions]] among individual families, Sephardic Bnei Anusim became a fully assimilated sub-group within the Iberian-descended Christian populations of Spain, Portugal, [[Hispanic America]] and Brazil. In the last 5 to 10 years,{{when|date=October 2022}} however, "organized groups of [Sephardic] Benei Anusim in Brazil, [[Colombia]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]], Mexico, [[Puerto Rico]], [[Venezuela]], [[Dominican Republic]] and in [[Iberia|Sefarad]] [Iberia] itself"<ref>{{cite book|first=ben Levi|last=Moshe|isbn=978-1-4633-2706-4|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OgzBQxoODWcC&q=Existen+ya+grupos+de+Benei+Anusim+organizados&pg=PA20|title=La Yeshivá Benei Anusim: El Manual de Estudios Para Entender las Diferencias Entre el Cristianismo y el Judaismo|publisher=Palibrio|year=2012|page=20|access-date=20 October 2020|archive-date=15 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415225609/https://books.google.com/books?id=OgzBQxoODWcC&q=Existen+ya+grupos+de+Benei+Anusim+organizados&pg=PA20|url-status=live}}</ref> have now been established, some of whose members have formally reverted to [[Judaism]], leading to the emergence of Neo-Western Sephardim (see group below).

The [[Jewish Agency for Israel]] estimates the Sephardic Bnei Anusim population to number in the millions.<ref name="nytimes.com">{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/14/world/europe/interest-in-israel-as-spain-weighs-citizenship-for-sephardic-jews.html|title=Prospect of Spanish Citizenship Appeals to Descendants of Jews Expelled in 1492|date=16 February 2014|work=The New York Times|access-date=25 February 2017|archive-date=23 July 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160723012448/http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/14/world/europe/interest-in-israel-as-spain-weighs-citizenship-for-sephardic-jews.html|url-status=live}}</ref> Their population size is several times larger than the three Jewish-integrated Sephardi descendant sub-groups combined, consisting of [[#Eastern Sephardim|Eastern Sephardim]], [[#North African Sephardim|North African Sephardim]], and the ex-converso [[Spanish and Portuguese Jews|Western Sephardim]] (both New World and Old World branches).

Although numerically superior, Sephardic Bnei Anusim is, however, the least prominent or known sub-group of Sephardi descendants. Sephardic Bnei Anusim are also more than twice the size of the total world Jewish population as a whole, which itself also encompasses [[Ashkenazi Jews]], [[Mizrahi Jews]] and [[Jewish ethnic divisions|various other smaller groups]].

Unlike the Anusim ("forced [converts]") who were the conversos up to the third, fourth or fifth generation (depending on the Jewish responsa) who later reverted to Judaism, the [[Bnei Anusim]] ("[later] sons/children/descendants [of the] forced [converts]") were the subsequent generations of descendants of the Anusim who remained hidden ever since the Inquisition in the Iberian Peninsula and its New World franchises. At least some Sephardic Anusim in the [[Hispanosphere]] (in Iberia, but especially in their colonies in Ibero-America) had also initially tried to revert to Judaism, or at least maintain crypto-Jewish practices in privacy. This, however, was not feasible long-term in that environment, as Judaizing conversos in Iberia and Ibero-America remained persecuted, prosecuted, and liable to conviction and execution. The Inquisition itself was only finally formally disbanded in the 19th century.

Historical documentation shedding new light on the diversity in the ethnic composition of the Iberian immigrants to the Spanish colonies of the Americas during the conquest era suggests that the number of [[New Christian]]s of Sephardi origin that actively participated in the conquest and settlement was more significant than previously estimated. A number of Spanish conquerors, administrators, settlers, have now been confirmed to have been of Sephardi origin. {{citation needed|date=October 2019}} Recent revelations have only come about as a result of modern DNA evidence and newly discovered records in Spain, which had been either lost or hidden, relating to conversions, marriages, baptisms, and Inquisition trials of the parents, grandparents and great-grandparents of the Sephardi-origin Iberian immigrants.

Overall, it is now estimated that up to 20% of modern-day Spaniards and 10% of colonial Latin America's Iberian settlers may have been of Sephardic origin, although the regional distribution of their settlement was uneven throughout the colonies. Thus, Iberian settlers of New Christian Sephardi-origin ranged anywhere from none in most areas to as high as 1 in every 3 (approx. 30%) Iberian settlers in other areas. With Latin America's current population standing at close to 590 million people, the bulk of which consists of persons of full or partial Iberian ancestry (both [[Hispanic America|New World Hispanics]] and [[Brazilians]], whether they're [[Criollo people|criollos]], [[mestizos]] or [[mulattos]]), it is estimated that up to 50 million of these possess Sephardic Jewish ancestry to some degree.

In Iberia, settlements of known and attested populations of Bnei Anusim include those in [[Belmonte Jews|Belmonte]], in Portugal, and the [[Xuetes]] of [[Palma, Majorca|Palma de Mallorca]], in Spain. In 2011 Rabbi [[Nissim Karelitz]], a leading rabbi and [[Halachic]] authority and chairman of the Beit Din Tzedek [[Beit Din|rabbinical court]] in [[Bnei Brak]], Israel, recognized the entire Xuete community of Bnei Anusim in Palma de Mallorca, as Jews.<ref name="jpost.com">{{Cite web |url=http://www.jpost.com/JewishWorld/JewishNews/Article.aspx?id=228936 |title="Chuetas of Majorca recognized as Jewish"; ''Jerusalem Post'' 07/12/2011 |date=29 September 2010 |access-date=23 March 2014 |archive-date=10 December 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121210081838/http://www.jpost.com/JewishWorld/JewishNews/Article.aspx?id=228936 |url-status=live }}</ref> That population alone represented approximately 18,000 to 20,000 people,<ref name="bbc.com">{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/stories-49374489|title=The New Yorker reviving Jewish life on a holiday island|date =18 August 2019|publisher=BBC}}</ref> or just over 2% of the entire population of the island. The proclamation of the Jews' default acceptance of Catholicism by the Portuguese king actually resulted in a high percentage being assimilated into the Portuguese population. Besides the Xuetas, the same is true of Spain. Many of their descendants observe a [[Syncretism|syncretist]] form of Christian worship known as [[Xueta Christianity]].<ref name="bbc.com"/><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.commentary.org/articles/robert-graves/a-dead-branch-on-the-tree-of-israel-the-xuetas-of-majorca/|title="A Dead Branch on the Tree of Israel" The Xuetas of Majorca|date =17 February 1957|publisher=Commentary}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Those of the Street - The Catholic-Jews of Mallorca: a Study in Urban Cultural Change|first=Kenneth|last=Moore|year=1976|isbn=978-0-674-03783-0|page=46|publisher=Michigan University Press}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Appetites and Identities: An Introduction to the Social Anthropology of Western Europe|first=Sara|last=Delamont|year=2002|isbn=978-1-134-92474-5|page=114|publisher=Taylor & Francis|quote=The Xueta had their own church—St Eulalia's—in their barrio, with a Xueta priest, and their own cofraternity (the Cross of Calvary) to march in the Holy Week procession.}}</ref>

Almost all Sephardic Bnei Anusim carry surnames which are known to have been used by Sephardim during the 15th century. However, almost all of these surnames are not specifically Sephardic ''per se'', and most are in fact surnames of gentile Spanish or gentile Portuguese origin which only became common among Bnei Anusim because they deliberately adopted them during their conversions to Catholicism, in an attempt to obscure their Jewish heritage.
Given that conversion made New Christians subject to Inquisitorial prosecution as Catholics, crypto-Jews formally recorded Christian names and gentile surnames to be publicly used as their aliases in notarial documents, government relations and commercial activities, while keeping their given Hebrew names and Jewish surnames secret.<ref>{{cite book |title=''Hispanidad y Judaísmo en Tiempos de Espinoza: Edición de "La Certeza del Camino" de Abraham Pereyra'' |last=Méchoulan |first=Henry |author-link=Henry Méchoulan |orig-year=1666|year=1987 |page=36}}</ref> As a result, very few Sephardic Bnei Anusim carry surnames that are specifically Sephardic in origin, or that are exclusively found among Bnei Anusim.