Artur Carlos de Barros Basto
| Arthur Carlos de Barros Basto | |
|---|---|
| Born | December 18, 1887 Amarante, Portugal |
| Died | March 8, 1961 Porto, Portugal |
| Nationality | Portuguese |
| Other names | Abraham Ben-Israel Brandon Rosh |
| Occupation | Military officer, philosopher, professor,translator, writer, editor, publisher, visionary |
| Title | Captain Barros Basto, Apostle of the Marranos,The Portuguese Dreyfus |
| Religion | Judaism |
Captain Arthur Carlos de Barros Basto, the Apostle of the Marranos who has become known as the Portuguese Dreyfus (Amarante, Portugal 1887-1961) was a decorated Portuguese military officer, a hero of Portugal's 1910 revolution and World War I and leader of the open return to Judaism of the Crypto-Jews of Portugal.[1]
He was born in the Portuguese city of Amarante on December 18, 1887 into a Christian family albeit with Jewish roots, descendant of Jews forcibly baptized in 1497 by royal edict. He was nine years old when his grandfather, Francisco de Barros Basto, told him they were of Jewish ancestry. Raised by his mother in Porto, he attended the Portuguese Military Academy and participated in 1910 in the founding of the Portuguese Republic. He was the first person in Porto to hoist the new flag of the Portuguese Republic on October 5, 1910. He was a member of the Free Masons (Grande Oriente Lusitano, Mountain Lodge, Lisbon), adopting the name of Giordano Bruno. He later commanded a battalion of the Portuguese Corps in World War I, as lieutenant on the Western front for which he was awarded the War Cross for bravery.
Upon his return to Portugal from the war he began to study Judaism and Hebrew. Rebuffed by the Jewish community of Lisbon, he went to Tangier to formally return to normative Judaism. There he was circumcised and welcomed into the Jewish fold by a Bet Din (Rabbinical court). He adopted the name of Abraham Israel Brandon Ben-Rosh. He married Lea Israel Monteiro Azancot daughter of a prominent Lisbon Jewish family. They had two children, Nuno Carlos Azancot de Barros Basto and a daughter Miryam Edite de Barros Basto. He is the great great uncle of the well known actress Daniela Ruah.
The family settled in Porto where in 1923 he started the Jewish community of Porto, still active today[2]. He founded the first yeshiva in Portugal in 500 years, the Israelite Theological Institute of Porto (Rosh Pina). In 1938, the year of Kristallnacht, in which approximately 200 synagogues were destroyed in Europe, Capatian Barros Basto completed the Kadoorie Mekor Haim synagogue, started in 1929 and financed by donations from the Sephardic diaspora (descendants of Iberian Jewish exiles) from London, Manchester, New York, Philadelphia, Amsterdam, Paris, Hamburg, etc; including the wealthy Kadoorie family. Many prominent individuals attended the inauguration of Mekor Haim including, Paul Goodman, president of the Portuguese Marranos Committee of Bevis Marks congregation in London, rabbi David de Sola Pool of the Spanish Portuguese synagogue of New York (Shearith Israel), the oldest Jewish congregation in the USA (1654), and professor Moses Amazalak, president of the Lisbon Israeli community.
Noted historian Cecil Roth named the grand art deco synagogue the "Cathedral of the North". Roth, who dubbed the Captain the "Apostle of the Marranos", wrote that he had never met a more charismatic man. Shortly after meeting the Captain in Porto in 1930, Cecil Roth wrote the classic, "A History of the Marranos", first published in 1932 by the Jewish Publication Society of Philadelphia.
Roth's moniker of the Captain as the "Apostle of the Marranos" was in recognition of the Captain's work of rescuing the secret Jews of Portugal known as New Christians, sometimes referred to as Marranos or Conversos and described in Hebrew as Anous or Anousim (forced ones). They were descendants of the thousands of Jews who were forcibly baptized in 1497 but instead of fleeing the realm like many of their brethren, they stayed behind and pretended to be good Catholics while remaining Jews in their hearts. Despite the evil monster that extended its tentacles into the very depths of humanity (there are approximately 40,000 Inquisition "processos" in the national archives), communities of secret Jews survived to this very day as exemplified by the celebrated case of Belmonte.
Barros Basto published and edited a theological newspaper, Ha-Lapid (the Torch)from 1927 to 1958, translating many Hebrew texts into Portuguese for the first time. He also taught Hebrew at the University of Porto and was friends with many leading intellectuals in the city.
"Adonai li velo ira Adonai (God) is with me and I will not fear"[3] was his motto as he travelled the interior of Portugal, sometime by horseback to isolated villages, enthusiastically exhorting the scattered New Christians back to the Jewish fold. He had great success,establishing synagogues in Braganza, and other communities. Some historians believe the Captain had as many as 10,000 adherents. However, he died a broken man in 1961 after being the target of an orchestrated campaign to destroy him.
In 1937, the Army, acting on anonymous complaints, believed to have been initiated by the Catholic Church, stripped him of his uniform and dignity, robbing him of medical benefits that may have saved the life of his son. Despite the adversity he suffered, Barros Basto continued to offer support and comfort to Jewish refugees fleeing the Nazi persecution. On his death bed he exclaimed that one day he would be vindicated. However, following the Carnation revolution of April 24, 1975 by radical army captains that overthrew the Salazar regime, a petition by his wife failed to clear his honor and dignity, again condemning him.
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[edit] Rehabilitation
Like Dreyfus, Captain Barros Basto was cleared of all charges on February 29, 2012 by the National Assembly of Portugal which voted unanimously upon the recommendation of Carlos Abreu Amorim and Fernando Negrão, members of the Civil Rights Committee of the National Assembly who found the accusations of 1937 (and confirmed in 1975) against the Captain to be baseless and motivated by anti-semitism. The Captain's posthumous reinstatement into the Army is imminent.
The Captain's granddaughter, Isabel Ferreira Lopes, who like her grandmother and mother have campaigned relentlessly for the rehabilitation of her grandfather, called the 1937 decision immoral, not her grandfather. She gratefully acknowledged the courage of the Civil Rights committee and the National Assembly in righting an historic wrong. She called it a victory for her grandfather,a victory for Portuguese Marranos, a victory for all Portuguese people,and a victory for all people fighting injustice. Abraham H. Foxman, the National Director of the Anti-Defamation League congratulated Portugal's National Assembly and said, “The vote was not only in favor of reinstating him, but was also in favor of Portugal’s honor. Just as this act of discrimination reflected a larger societal problem at the time, the long overdue rehabilitation of Captain Barros Basto reflects Portugal’s commitment to human rights today.”[4]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ de Azevedo Mea, Elvira; Steinhard, Inácio (1997). Ben-Rosh - A Biography of Captain Barros Basto, the Apostle of the Marranos. Edições Afrontamento. ISBN 978-9723604368.
- ^ Comunidade Israelita do Porto (Oporto Jewish Congregation)
- ^ Psalms 118:6
- ^ http://adl.org/main_Anti_Semitism_International/6254_13.htm
Cecil Roth, A History of the Marranos, Filadélfia, 1932. Cecil Roth, L'Apôtre des Marranes, Paris, 1930. Samuel Schwarz, Os cristãos-novos em Portugal no século XX, Lisboa, 1925. Elvira de Azevedo Mea e Inácio Steinhard, Ben-Rosh : Biografia do Capitão Barros Basto, o apóstolo dos marranos, 1997 Valadares, Paulo. A genealogia mítica e real do Capitão Barros Basto, o "Guia dos Maranos. In: Raízes e Memórias nº 23, dezembro de 2007, Lisboa: Associação Portuguesa de Genealogia, pp. 123–131 Alexandre Teixeira Mendes, Barros Basto, A Miragem Marrana, Porto, Ladina, 2007
