New Edition of Sephardi Story: New Approach to Jewish History: Celebration of Jewish History

Jewish and Spanish history are brought together in wholly unexpected ways in The Sephardi Story. The Jews called Sephardim are linked indissolubly with Spain through their 800 years of residence there, known in history as a ‘golden age’. All seemed ended in 1492 when they were suddenly expelled by royal decree; but now, 500 years later, the unbroken cultural links are being celebrated in truly royal style with the King of Spain rescinding the decree, and with the Sephardim being welcomed as full participants in the Columbus Quincentennial of 1992. If this is a dramatic turnaround in itself, the full picture is infinitely wider. When the Sephardim spread over the Mediterranean countries and later to north-west Europe and across the Atlantic, this was a continuation of the earlier story in which the Jews shared fully in the cultural revolution that followed the rise of Islam and the regeneration in succeeding centuries of the lost world of classical science and philosophy. In our