Sephardic Heritage

The Inquisition began in the 13th century to rout out Christian heretics. In Spain, which had been a Jewish cultural and intellectual hub for centuries, the Inquisition began in 1481. The Edict forced all Jews out of Spain. Most of them fled to Portugal only to meet the same fate there when the Inquisition became official in 1536,

In "The Sephardic Heritage", Dr. Herbert Ausubel's years of painstaking historical research culminate in a gripping tale of one branch of his distinguished family, his Sephardic ancestors.

We learn about the Portuguese Inquisition through the story of Antonio José da Silva (1705-1739), Portugal's most famous playwright of the era. The author knew that the Inquisitors had kept careful records. His son, now Dr. Ian Ausubel, was in Europe on a concert tour. So, Ausubel asked him to find out where the records of the trial were kept, and if he could, obtain a copy of it. He did.

Ausubel found that da Silva was a prolific satirist, and the Grand Inquisitor of Portugal was determined to have him burnt at the stake. Da Silva's confession before the court was one of the most magnificent declarations for religious liberty in world history.

Incredibly, though they were spread throughout the world, Ausubel's ancestors managed to hold onto their heritage. One of the author's ancestors took the family scroll with him. Having moved into the Ashkenasic Jewish world, the family lost command of the Ladino language and began to speak and write in Yiddish. The da Silvas were given the German sounding name of Silber (Silver in English). That was the case with the author's paternal great grandmother.

In 1946, Dr. Solomon Silver introduced what he called "the Atomic Cocktail", at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. Dr. Silver is viewed as the founder of the field of Nuclear Medicine.