A Multi-religious City

By Brendan Eig

Day 12 in Spain brings us to the fifth city of our dialogue: Cordoba. The city of Cordoba has had multiple eras of rule since the Romans established it in the 1st century. After the Visigoths came to power in the 6th century, it went through a period of Islamic rule from the 9th century until the Christian conquest of 1236. From this date on, Cordoba has been a Catholic city under the rule of the Spanish Crown.

One of the unique qualities of Cordoba is the interaction between the three Abrahamic religions in the medieval era of Andalusia. As we learned from today’s guides, Cordoba provides a model for what religious coexistence might have and could look like. In the Islamic Golden Era, Jews and Christians lived side by side with Muslims in a form of peaceful coexistence. In fact, inter-religious conflicts were more common than conflict between religions. Seen in the various religious sites of Cordoba, we viewed this tolerance, coexistence and in some ways, integration.

The first of these sites is the Mosque-Cathedral of Cordoba. The current structure which we visited was built as a mosque at the end of the 8th century in just 10 months. Interestingly, as the Mosque was built on a pre-existing structure, it does not face Mecca. The pillars within the Mosque are made of two colors of marble: pink and black. Within these pillars, the names of workers who built the mosque were inscribed into the marble.

Once the Christians conquered the city of Cordoba, King Ferdinand III asked the Vatican for permission to convert the Mosque into a Church. With the Pope’s permission, the Mosque was altered slightly, and a massive main chapel was constructed. Luckily for our viewing, the mosque was mostly left untouched. In another chapel that was built in the 18th century, there is a Corpus Christi made of gold that is used for procession. However, the Corpus Christi is over 200 kilos, far too heavy to carry and is instead transported on wheels.

After the Mosque-Cathedral, we continued into the Jewish Quarter of Cordoba. Unfortunately, there no longer is a Jewish population in this city so this was purely historical. Before Jews were expelled from Cordoba and Spain, the Spanish Crown decreed that no synagogue could be larger than the smallest church. As a result, the synagogue that we visited was quite small but still filled with intricate Jewish designs.

Moving along, we visited a typical house in the Jewish Quarter during the 14th century. There, we were able to see the end of the Fiesta de los Patios, a flower decoration of private citizens’ courtyards. While most of the flowers were being put away, there were still some bunches of roses on display. At our final stop within this quarter, we learned about Sephardic Jewish history and Ladino music at la Casa Sephardic.

At la Casa Sefarad, our first guide sang some songs that were common for Sephardic Jews to sing at the time. His pronunciation and voice were wonderful even though he was not Jewish and did not know the language of Hebrew, merely the history. He shared versions of these songs in seven languages spoken by Sephardic Jews: Hebrew, Spanish, English, Arabic, Turkish, French & Italian.

Our next guide focused more on the history of Sephardic Jews before, during, and after the expulsion. The Jewish population of Cordoba thrived in the Islamic Golden Age aided by Hasdai ibn Shaprut. He harbored discussions with leaders of the Andalusian region and advocated successfully for the coexistence of Jews in Cordoba and regions around the world.

However, the good favor of the Jews would begin to sour as they were blamed for the Black Death. And ultimately, many years after the expulsion, the Jewish identity of Spain was lost. As our guide explained, due to the Spanish Crown’s fierce persecution of Jewish people, many Spaniards who may be Jewish today would be unaware of their Jewish ties which explains the small Jewish population we see in Spain today. Cordoba, a city that bolstered such a strong promise of peaceful coexistence eventually fell into a period of nonreligious tolerance, a tragic effect of the Reconquest of Spain.