I was reading this book over sabbá. She brings some interesting data, but the very beginning of her analysis is so wrong, that I feel like putting the book down. It is evident that the writer is completely clueless about Judaism and Jewish identity (especially the Sephardic variant)
First she keeps asking a question that looks like a joke to me, she wonders why they decided to establish a Jewish community.(!!!) "why the marchands Portugais chose to emerge as Jews and to establish such a community" She starts her answer with "The explanation is not a simple one".
I am pretty sure any of you could answer that question with a simple answer comprised of one very short sentence.
Then she starts analysing the level of "commitment to Judaism", and does this basically by comparing it to Ashkenazi communities. She describes a typical Western Sephardic community -although it lacked the intellectual activity of the Amsterdam, Venice and Leghorn communities- with Jewish institutions, synagogues, schools, kasher butchers, shabbath observance, etc.
But -don't laugh! this is a serious work by a scholar!- they "'replaced' Yiddish with Spanish" and "introduced French and arithmetic into the curriculum".
The Sephardic Jews of Bordeaux on Questia
