The process of Portuguese nationality through the Sephardic route has been closed since September 1, 2022. However, the Portuguese Parliament is discussing a possible reopening of the process. If this happens, we will report it here.
The Law
Learn more about the Law that allowed the Sephardic process in this link: https://asefarad.com/nuevaley/
Am I Sephardic?
Find out if you are a descendant of Sephardic Jews in our database https://asefarad.com/ancestros/
The History
The expulsion of the Jews was ordered by the Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella of Castile on March 31, 1492, by means of the Edict of Granada.
Many Spanish Jews crossed the border and fled to Portugal, where peace would be a fleeting sun, since King Manuel I, upon marrying Isabella of Aragon, daughter of these sovereigns, undertook to continue the persecution.
One of the most shocking historical events of the reign of Manuel I was the so-called Massacre of Lisbon on April 19, 1506. As a small crowd prayed for the end of the drought at the Convent of São Domingos, someone called attention to an illuminated face of Christ on the altar. A Christian convert tried to explain that the phenomenon was the result of a reflection of the sun, which led the crowd to kill him. This fact became a fuse for the persecutions of the Jews. Spurred on by the Dominican friars, the people of Lisbon killed men, women and children in the name of the Catholic faith. It was enough that someone suspected that the person professed the Jewish faith.
D. Manuel I confiscated the property of the Jews involved and punished the instigating friars with death by hanging. This massacre accentuated the anti-Semitic climate in Portugal.
In 1540 the Tribunal of the Inquisition came into operation, which lasted until 1821 and made it virtually impossible for Jews to remain in Portuguese territory.
Iberian Jews could only leave the territory after paying a ransom to the king and abandoning their properties or selling them at a vile price.
The New Christians or Marranos are the incarnation of crypto-Judaism, that is to say, of a covert Judaism. This social phenomenon marked the emigration of many families of Iberian settlers, both to Portuguese and Spanish possessions.
These families were made up of new Christians but, in reality, they did not stop practicing Jewish customs and prayers, in the strictest secrecy. At the end of the 15th century, Jews constituted between 10% and 15% of the Portuguese population, rising from 50,000 to 170,000 after the expulsion from Spain decreed by the Catholic Monarchs. The Jews of the Iberian Peninsula fled the persecution, heading for other territories, of which England, Holland and North Africa were the first destinations. Thousands of people emigrated to Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Ecuador where many descendants of Sephardic Jews are still concentrated today.
The Reparation
To repair this historical damage, the Spanish and Portuguese legislators decided to issue laws to allow the acquisition of Spanish or Portuguese nationality to the descendants of the Sephardic Jews expelled from the Iberian Peninsula. In the case of Portugal, the Portuguese Nationality Law (Lei da Nacionalidade) was issued.
