The Orden de Oraciones de mes arreo (Ferrara 1555) and a Bakasah composed by Abraham Usque

La British Library conserva la única copia conocida de un libro de oraciones compuesto en 1555 por Abraham Usque: e l Libro de Oraciones de mes arreo. Usque era consciente de las dificultades que tenían muchos de los antiguos marranos, aún no familiarizados con la liturgia judía, en seguir el a veces largo y complicado servicio de la sinagoga. Abraham trató de proporcionar una versión simplificada del sidur, y lo abrevió en parte. En el Prólogo afirmó que había presentado las oraciones de un modo llano y directo (arreo), sin que hubiera necesidad de hojear el libro en busca de la continuación del servicio. Abraham introdujo en su sidur una nueva oración mediante la cual pedía al Señor que pusiera fin a los sufrimientos de Israel, que elevara a un vástago de David, y que devolviera a Su pueblo su antigua gloria y dignidad. El autor deseaba ofrecer una respuesta reconfortante a los deseos y esperanzas de su generación. Al igual que los judíos que abandonaron España en 1492, también los marranos portugueses que llegaron a Ferrara a mediados del s. XVI continuaron protegiendo los valores culturales, profundamente enraizados, de su antiguo hogar, y consideraron su salida de la Península Ibérica como un hecho catastrófico. Abraham Usque pidió al Señor que se contentara con los castigos ya infligidos a Su pueblo y que otorgara su perdón a los hijos de Israel, que ya habían abandonado por completo toda idolatría.

The Orden de oraciones de mes arreo is the second known Hturgical work ^ pubhshed by Abraham Usque in vernacular, or alternately the third one if we are to count the Spanish Psalter, ^^ which is a part of the Bible but was pubhshed for liturgical and meditational use. It is possible, however, that in the same period other prayer-books (or reprints of the first ones) came to light, but were lost without a trace in the ensuing centuries.
As far as it is known, up until the year 1555, the former Marranos of Ferrara who were still unfamiliar with Hebrew could rely for the service for the Three Holydays (o>!7n \yb\y) either on Yomtob Atias' Libro de Oracyones de Todo el año, ^^ or on Isac Cavallero's Orden de oraciones segundo el uso ebrèo en lengua / ebraica y vulguar español ^^ and its related editions, ^^ which comprised the essential part of the liturgy for the Holidays.
The Libro de Oracyones by Yomtob Atias was almost omni-comprehensive, but had the drawback of being rather bulky and difficult to handle on account of its many cross references, so that former ' The complete title is: LIBRO/DE ORACYONES/ de todo el año traduzido / del Hebrayco de verbo a ver/bo de antiguos exem/plares, por quanto / los ympressos / fasta a qui / estan errados, con muchas / cosas acrescentadas de / nuevo según por la / siguiente tabla se / muestra / 5312 [=1552] De la Criación / a 14 de Sivan.
The bilingual Orden de oraciones by Isac Cavallero comprised the Amidah (n*r>Dv) and the additional prayer (^OÌD) for the . At the present state of research we do not know whether and how widely the Spanish Siddurim printed in Venice were available and adopted for ritual use in Ferrara before 1555.
In the title of his prayer-book, Abraham Usque claimed to have presented the prayers in a plain and user-friendly way, without the necessity of having to leaf through the book to find the continuation of a particular prayer during the service. Hence the name of the Siddur: arreo .S. [= saber] sin boltar de / vna a otra parte. Usque had already dealt with this problem in his mnn (Mahazor), where a special chapter is devoted to the task of explaining how to follow the repetition of the hamidot in the Synagogue and how and when to answer to the Hazan (cantor). ^^ The Siddur arreo comprises the service for Hanukah and Purim. It included also the essential parts of the prayers for the three Moadim, which the Portuguese called Tres Pascuas: Pascua de Pão Ázimo, Pascua de Cabanas and Pascua de Sebuot. It did not include the prayers for the New Year and the Day of Atonement for which Usque's Spanish nnnn was available.
In 1553, in his Prologue to the Spanish Psalter Abraham Usque stressed that he was a member of the team that translated the Bible in cooperation with eminent scholars. ^^ He also claimed to have introduced revisions and changes of the text of the translation. His statements might reveal previous disagreements with other editors or could ^"^ It was the merit of Herman P. Salomon to clearly establish that the Spanish vulgarisations printed in Ferrara were primarily conceived for synagogue use. simply express the desire to faithfully retain the meaning of the sacred texts. 1^ An analogous -and hitherto overlooked-statement is found in the title page of the mmn from which it appears that the translation and the amendments (and not only the printing) were the fruit of his work: trasladado en español y de nuevo emedado por yndustria y diligecia de Abraham Usque.
A hint to new amendments is also found in the title of the Siddur with which we are dealing here. ^^ In 1555, however, Abraham Usque was already an estabhshed publisher and he did not feel the need to stress the importance of his personal contribution. Neither did he need to explain the practice, already adopted in the Biblia ^^ and in several prayer-books, both in Ferrara and in Venice, ^^ of translating the Hebrew text word by word.
In his Prologue «al Lector» the publisher stresses his desire to provide a better and easier-to-use book, which would obviate [at least in part] the necessity to frequently turn the pages to find the continuation of certain prayers, as it had happened theretofore. Abraham Usque reported to have acceded to the request of an anonimous friend of his, described as «his lord» [and the probable sponsor of the undertaking]. In so doing the pubhsher hoped to provide a much desired solution to a widely felt need: Movido curioso ^i Lector, por ruego e devoción de un amiguo y Señor mio a enprimir el presente libro de Oraciones arreo por mejor y mas claro estilo que fasta aqui por seer muy fastidioso el boltar de vna a otra parte, Determine obedecerle viendo quãto a todo seria agradable. Assi que a su requesta me puse a estamparlo y por que my yntento en el principio fue remetir en la oración de Sabath dos vezes a la cotediana, puse ciertos señales los quales no sierven por que torne arrehazer lo que remetia fino el de volta en folio xiii. Lo que causo fallarense algunas fojas sin nunero.

THE ORDEN DE ORACIONES AND ITS CONTENT
At the beginning of the Tabla ^^ Usque calls attention to some passages selected in order to permit worshippers to fulfil the obligation of studying every day a (symbohc) portion of Torah and Rabbinic Hterature, before the commencement of the service proper: § Micra. Y fablo .A. a Moseh ^6 (f.)vj § Ghemara. Aabaye era ordenan[do] ^^ vij y conficion del saffumerio ^^ xlix fasta bendezira su pueblo con paz Ij " In smaller characters in the book. ^^ Ghemara (instead of Guemara): the rendering of the «:^» of mD> with «gh» was probably due to Italian influence: must we assume that Abraham Usque employed Italian worker(s) for the composition?
"^ Some pages of the gathering containing the Tabla are marked at their bottom with an asterisk.
"^ As we have pointed out, this section of the book is missing from the volume in the British Library. It is therefore difficult to state which of the many biblical passages starting with these words was chosen by Abraham Usque.
"^ Talmud Babli, Yoma, f. 33a: Abaye (»nN) stated the order of the daily Altar service according to Mosaic tradition and to the opinion of Abba Shaul.
As it can be gathered from the Tabla, the compiler of the Siddur abridged this part of the service which serves as an introduction to the prayers proper. Usque was well aware of the difficulties, encountered by former Marranos recently returned to their ancient faith, to follow the sometime long and compHcated subtleties of Jewish Uturgy and decided to provide a simplified version of the Siddur. We can consider this as another aspect of the effort, undertaken by many scholars, to reintroduce the newcomers to the practice of Judaism.
In the Tabla the description of the above passages is followed by a Ust of Bakashoth (Poetical Supplications) for which the page numbers are not specified, as these hymns were printed in a (later inserted?) gathering composed of unnumbered leaves.
The index continues with a detailed list of daily and Saturday prayers. ^^ This is followed by the description of prayers for different holidays, as stated above. A collection of blessings for various occasions of everyday life is provided at the end of the book. There is no colophon and no Register of gatherings.
At the end of the last page, after some blessings to be recited at the Beth Ha-Haim (the Judeo-Spanish euphemism for cemetery), we find a short sentence with a few words of gratitude to the Lord, for permitting the redactor to bring his work to a successful conclusion: ^^ Mishnah Zebahim, chapter 5: «Which are the places where the sacrifices were offered.» ^° Talmud Babli, Shabbath, f. 20a: i>P'^*î^ V^ î^^^"» VP^^^D nnn. ^' «Rebi Ysmahel dizien»: this passage is derived from the Sifra (Aram.: Hiût?, collection of midrashim to the Book of Leviticus) and is included in all Siddurim. In this well-known Baraita Rabbi Ishmael stated that the Torah may be expounded by thirteen methods.
^" As we have pointed out, this section is no longer extant in the volume at the British Library.
(c) Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas Licencia Creative Commons 3.0 España (by-nc) http://sefarad.revistas.csic.es http://sefarad.revistas.csic.es «Acabosse a loor del Dio ^^ la presente Orden de Oraciones. A 6 de Tisri. 5316.» ^4 As in many other Sephardic prayer books, a place of honour is reserved to the Bakashah {r^vpi): nuDi nbv)3 mn^ bD («Todos criados de arriba y abaxo»), particularly popular among the Marranos returned to Judaism as the poem reaffirms the unicity and unalterable unity of God. ^^ We compared the Bakasah, as it appears in Usque's Siddur, with the text of the same prayer in the Libro de Oracyones de todo el año by Yomtob Atias, and we found the wording of the translation to be identical. However, the arrangement of lines is different. ^^ For a couple of blessings Usque provided the «Hebrew text» transliterated in Latin characters in order to allow former Marranos, still unacquainted with the language of their ancestors, to take part in the service and pronounce these prayers correctly. On these and on other analogous transcriptions found in different prayer-books, we are planning to refer soon in this same review.
The Ferrara vulgarisations served as the model for the prayerbooks published in the Western Sephardic Communities of Amsterdam, Hamburg and London in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. ^^ Among these works the Orden de oraciones de mes arreo was perhaps the most popular and the most frequently reprinted (sometimes with addendums and modifications). ^^ Particular mention deserve the 1612 and 1618 Amsterdam editions, published respectively by the Neveh Shalom ^^ and by the Beth ^^ «Dio» (instead of «Dios» as usual in Spanish): rigorously singular, to stress the detachment from the past, when the Marranos were compelled to bow in front of sculptures and paintings of Christian Saints.
^^ «This prayer-book was completed, for the glory of the Lord, on With an original procedure Abraham Usque inserted into his Siddur (unnumbered folios llr-llv) a new prayer by which he asked the Lord to put an end to the sufferings of Israel, to rise up a scion of David, and to restore His people to its ancient glory and dignity.
The Author wanted to provide a reassuring answer to the anxieties and hopes of his generation. The physical and spiritual pains of his contemporaries are not described in the prayer as they were famihar to his readers and were part of their personal experience.
Likewise the Jews who left Spain in 1492, also Abraham Usque's contemporary exiles, i.e. the Marranos who had escaped from Portugal in order to return to Judaism (mainly after 1531), ^^ considered their departure from the Iberian Peninsula as the most catastrophic event to befall the Jewish people since the destruction of the second Temple. They continued to cherish the deeply rooted cultural values of their erstwhile homeland. "^"^ The agony of their perilous and heartbreaking flight from the Peninsula was devastating. Most of the recent refugees regarded it as a supreme sacrifice offered to the Lord and wondered whether this extreme proof of devotion might help them in obtaining the Divine pardon.
The exiles raised questions about the rationale and the significance of their recent history and the causes of the tragic situation of a great part of their Nation, who were entrapped and persecuted in the Peninsula.
The former-conversos were imbued by widespread messianic hopes and were strongly influenced by the mystic doctrines emanating from Safed, which gave cosmic and human significance to the exile and to their hopes of redemption. "^^ All these elements are found in Samuel Usque's Consolaçam ^^ published by Abraham Usque in 1553, only two years before the appearance of Orden de oraciones herein described.
As Robert Bonfil has clearly stated, Samuel's Consolaçam, together with other contemporary works, fulfilled, inter alia, the function of providing the former-conversos with the consciousness of a modern Sephardi identity away from the Peninsula. "" As expressed on the title page of Samuel Usque's Consolaçam, this author attempted to convey a message of hope to his afflicted contemporaries in order to mitigate their anguish.
All through his work Samuel repeatedly explained that the manifold, continuous sufferings of Israel were the result of repeated transgressions, every punishment being the immediate result of a specific sin. "^^ In this rationale a sin was always followed by a punishment of proportional intensity, but never so strong and decisive to jeopardize the very existence of Israel. Furthermore, every punishment finds its explanation in specific prophecies, carefully quoted after the narration of each tribulation.  According to Samuel Usque's interpretation, the Inquisition was introduced in Portugal by king John III as a consequence of the fact that: «The New Christians were immersed in pursuit of power, wealth and the honours of high office, and were deceived by it to the point that they had nearly forgotten their ancient faith and lost the fear of the Wellspring from which all life emanates, because of their vast riches, high offices and honours that they had acquired in the Kingdom [of Portugal].» 49 Because of their assimilation to Christians, the Men of the Nation became guilty of idolatry and were compelled to worship strange gods made of wood and stone. The Inquisition, depicted by Samuel Usque as a horrible monster, was the instrument chosen by the Lord to perform the punishment of this transgression according to the biblical prophecy of Deuteronomy 28: «And the Lord shall scatter you from the one end of the earth unto the other end of the earth ^o and there you shall serve other gods, which you have not known, neither you nor your fathers...» ^^ The cult of strange gods made of wood and stone contained at one time the elements of transgression and punishment. However, the curses hsted in the so-called Parashat Tokhehot were the last ones recorded in the Torah. They were now completely fulfilled and the sons of Israel had suffered all the misfortunes pronounced by the Lord. The time had therefore come for the end of their tribulations. The final Redemption was at hand but it depended on the wholehearted return of New Christians to Judaism. ^^ This was the message delivered by Samuel Usque's Consolaçam. Abraham Usque picked it up and tacitly used it as an unexpressed preliminary statement to his new Bakasah. He rightly assumed that his readers were acquainted with the arguments discussed by Samuel Usque as they had already contended with the same doubts and raised the same fundamental questions about the reasons of their suffering and on the fate of their Nation.
Without any preamble, in his new Bakasah Abraham supplicates the Lord to be content with the punishments already inflicted to His people, to redeem the sons of Israel and restore them to their ancient splendour, to re-establish in their midst the glory of the Lord, and to bless them with the enactment of Messianic Age, to show his pity for all the ones who have been faithful to the sacred covenant and spent their lives awaiting for the day of the Redemption.
In a unique hint to the sins of idolatry, Abraham Usque claimed that the sons of Israel (at least those reciting this prayer) had completely cast adrift every idolatrie practice and forgotten the cult of depicted images («cosa de pintura»). A more overt reference to Catholic rites was unthinkable in September 1555, at a time when Pope Paul IV had already stepped up the persecutions against the Portuguese Jews of Ancona, where all the former Marranos were arrested and twenty five of them were to die later on the stake. ^^ We are publishing in extenso, in appendix, the text of the Bakasah Nueva (New Bakashah) by Abraham Usque, with an English translation.

THE ROLE OF ABRAHAM USQUE IN THE FERRARA PRESS AND THE ORIGINS OF HIS JEWISH LEARNING
For many years Abraham Usque has been considered as a simple craftsman. In effect, his contribution to the Sephardic Press of Ferrara was not limited to the work of printing as some authors have suggested. Elena Romero was perhaps the first to ascribe more importance to his role. This scholar realized that Abraham was not only a printer, but also one of the editors of the Biblia de Ferrara, ^^ Y. H. Yerushalmi stated that, in effect, Abraham was both printer and publisher as he (at times) employed press workers and editors. ^^ From ^^ A. TOAFF, «Nuova luce sui Marrani di Ancona (1556) the prologue to the Spanish Psalter we learn that Abraham was also one of the translators of the Biblia Española. He also claimed to have corrected and modified some parts of the translation of the Psalms. ^^ As we have seen, Abraham was also the author of a new prayer, introduced in his Siddur.
In his works Usque reveals a profound knowledge of Bibhcal texts (variously quoted in the Bakasah), of Talmudic and Midrashic literature (quoted in the Prologo and in the Tabla) and of Jewish hturgy (widely displayed in the Orden de oraciones and in the inno).
It is challenging to wonder where Abraham could acquire his wide learning. From a document kept at the Archives Générales du Royaume in Brussels we learn that one Duarte Pinei ^"^ was in Antwerp in or around 1550. Together with other New Christians recently arrived in the Flanders, he tried to obtain a licence to remain in the northern city, in spite of the recent decree of expulsion issued by Charles V. ^^ Duarte Pinei does not appear in another, later, document comprising the names of New Christians living in Antwerp toward the end of 1550. We assume that he was compelled to leave the city. At the present state of research we do not know where Abraham hved between 1550 and 1553, when his name was first associated to the Ferrara Press. Wherever he spent this span of time, it does not seem to be sufficient to acquire such a wide knowledge of Judaism. We are inclined to believe that Abraham probably had developed his acquaintance with Jewish religion before settling in Italy (or in the Levant), towards 1550. As the date of his birth is still unknown, we cannot state, even tentatively, whether and where he had an opportunity to familiarize himself with Hebraic learning.  For quan dichoso y bien auenturado este triste pueblo se fallaría, viendo en sus dias este dia de nos tan estunado y desseado How joyful and fortunate these sad people would be if they were to see during their lifetime this so long awaited and dreamt of day Mas triste que solo la esperança veo que nos queda y con ella fenescieron los que duormen ya con sus pasados So more sad as I see that only hope is left, that hope which accompanied our brethren who rest with their ancestors Y solo este bien, y este desseo tenemos nos y también ellos tuuieron por nuestras tam continuas culpas y pecados This only asset and this hope we have -and our brethrens hadbecause of our continuous sins and guilt Y pues tu piadoso y Excelente sabes bien lo que tienes prometido ^^ redímenos que somos, y emos sido oprobio y desonrra entre la gente ^^ 59 Ezek. 36, 26: «And I will give you a new heart and a new spirit.» Cfr. Deut. 28,65. ^° II Sam. 7,[12][13][14][15][16]22,51 ;Jer. 23,5 ;Ezek. 37,[24][25]89,[4][5]42 ;Mie. 7,20;Ps. 106,37;Ezek. 34,29;Psalms 44,[14][15]79,4 ;22,[7][8][9].