JUDAICA - Wisdom In Torah

arrios, daniel levi de
become an NDP member of the federal Parliament from 1988
to 1993, when he retired.
[Harold Troper (2nd ed.)]
BARRIOS, DANIEL LEVI (Miguel) DE (1635–1701), Spanish
poet and playwright. Barrios was born in Montilla, of a
Portuguese Marrano family, and was one of the most eminent
exiles who contributed to Spanish literature. Following the
execution in 1655 of a relative, Marco (Isaac) de Almeyda *Bernal,
Barrios’ family left Spain, his parents settling in Algiers
and he in Italy. After a sojourn at Nice and Leghorn (where
he reverted to Judaism), he sailed with his first wife, Debora
Váez, to Tobago, where she soon died. Barrios then moved
to the Netherlands and in 1662 married Abigail de Pina in
Amsterdam. At about the same time he took a commission
as a captain in the Spanish Netherlands, and for the next 12
years lived outwardly as a Christian in Brussels, while simultaneously
maintaining a connection with the Jewish community
in Amsterdam. In 1674, Barrios renounced his military
commission and thereafter lived openly as a professing Jew
in Amsterdam. A follower of Shabbetai Ẓevi, Barrios had
mystical delusions and often fasted for long periods. This
so alarmed his wife that she hurried to R. Jacob *Sasportas
on the first day of Passover, 1675, and pleaded for his assistance.
Sasportas found Barrios prepared for the Messiah’s
advent before the New Year and convinced that the Christians,
headed by the Dutch monarch, would convert to Judaism.
As he dryly records in his Ẓiẓat Novel Ẓevi (1737), Sasportas
found it necessary to remind the deluded poet of his immediate
family obligations and of the perilous state of his
health.
Barrios’ work can be divided into two periods, before and
after 1674. In Brussels, he emphasized classical and pagan allusions
and in Amsterdam stressed his Jewishness, while retaining
a great admiration for the Spanish poet Luis de Góngora.
His first work, Flor de Apolo (Brussels, 1665), is a collection
of poetry on varied themes; in the same volume he published
three plays, Pedir favor al contrario, El canto junto al encanto
and El Español de Orán, which were typical of the contemporary
Spanish theater. An allegorical drama, Contra la verdad
no hay fuerza (Amsterdam, undated, but before 1672), glorified
the memory of three martyrs who died in an auto-da-fé in
Cordoba in June while Coro de las Musas (Brussels and Amsterdam,
1672) contains poetic eulogies of the Spanish provinces
and of famous people and cities, preceded by a panegyric
on Charles II of England.
Barrios was one of the outstanding men of letters of
17th century Spain, who, together with other New Christians,
contributed a great deal to the Spain’s Golden Age. Like most
Jews who left the Iberian Peninsula, as Jews in 1492 or as New
Christians in subsequent years, Barrios retained the Spanish
tongue as his language for every need and occasion. Whereas
the Sephardi refugees developed Judezmo or Ladino, written
in Hebrew script, the New Christians who returned to Judaism
continued to use the Spanish and Portuguese languages as
they were accustomed to in the Peninsula. Even though they
returned to Judaism, many like Barrios continued to live in a
culturally Spanish and Portuguese milieu, in Amsterdam or
in Venice. Besides the cultural and linguistic legacy from the
Peninsula, writers like Barrios brought with them into the
Sephardi Diaspora certain concepts that can best described
as Marranism. This consisted mainly of relying on the Old
Testament part of the Bible as well as the apocryphal books,
preserving certain very elementary dietary regulations, and
celebrating in some way some Jewish festivals. Quite a number
of Christian practices were adopted as a matter of course.
To gain Jewish knowledge from books was difficult in Spain,
but not impossible, thanks to the Spanish Hebraists. Poets
of New Christian origin had different experiences once they
returned to Judaism. Barrios had enough Jewish knowledge
while a Crypto-Jew, but he found it rather difficult to adjust.
He finally adopted messianic tendencies which might have
been Christian-inspired. This affected the style and mood of
his poetry.
The works of Barrios’ Amsterdam period constitute five
major collections. Sol de la vida (Antwerp, 1679) contains the
Libre albedrío, a defense of the doctrine of free will. His Triumpho
del govierno popular y de la antigüedad holandesa (Amsterdam,
1683), of which at least seven versions exist, includes
sections on the history of the Amsterdam Sephardi community
and its organizations. Some copies contain two religious
poems: La mayor perfección de Ley santisima and Triumpho
canta la inmortalidad del Pueblo de Israel. The undated treatise,
Relación de los poetas y escritores españoles de la Nación judaica
amstelodama (republished by M. Kayserling in REJ, 18 (1889),
276–89), is a rich, though sometimes highly romanticized,
source of information on Sephardi literary figures. Alegrías
o pinturas lucientes de himeneo (Amsterdam, 1686), a collection
of wedding poems and panegyrics, commemorates some
eminent Sephardi families. The most notable compositions in
Estrella de Jacob sobre Flores de Lis (Amsterdam, 1686) are “La
Memoria renueva el dolor,” on the death of the poet’s wife, and
two religious compositions, “Providencia de Dios sobre Israel”
and “Diás penitenciales.” Metros nobles (Amsterdam, 1675?)
contains the religious poems also found in the (presumably
earlier) Triumpho del govierno popular. Outstanding among
Barrios’ many other writings is his Imperio de Dios en la harmonía
del mundo (Brussels, 1673?), the first part of a grandiose
work intended as a poetic version of the Pentateuch. Barrios’
literary output is uneven in quality, since he wrote to gain patronage
to provide for himself and his family. As the poet laureate
of Amsterdam Jewry he was a facile versifier, but some
of his religious poems, thanks to their sincerity of feeling and
elegance of expression, deserve wider recognition. Their general
themes are the permanence and excellence of the Jewish
faith, belief in free will, the author’s repentance for the sin of
posing as a Christian, and the harmony of Creation. Barrios
glorified Sephardi culture (and its prime center, the Jewish
community of Amsterdam), and perpetuated the memory
of notable victims of the Inquisition. There is some evidence
176 ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 3