First Outreach Center for Brazilian Anousim Opens
For the first time, a Jewish educational center has opened in Brazil aimed at reaching out to the large numbers of Bnai Anousim living in the area
Bnai Anousim are descendants of Jews forcibly converted to Catholicism during the Inquisition which began in the 15th century.
“Beit Aryeh – the Shavei Israel Center for Bnai Anousim” is located in the northern Brazilian city of Recife. It was launched at the initiative of the Jerusalem-based Shavei Israel organization, which reaches out and assists “lost Jews” seeking to return to the Jewish people.
Heading the center is Rabbi Avraham Amitai, who was dispatched last year as Shavei Israel’s official emissary in Recife, where he also serves as rabbi of the local Jewish community. A graduate of Israeli rabbinical seminaries, Rabbi Amitai is fluent in Hebrew, English and Portuguese.
“The center will serve as a focal point of our outreach work to Bnai Anousim here in northern Brazil”, Rabbi Amitai said, noting that “there are large numbers of people in this part of the country whose families are of Jewish descent and who wish to return to their roots.” 
“We have already begun holding classes,” he said, “for those interested in learning more about their Jewish heritage and reconnecting with the Jewish people.” Subjects taught at the Center include Hebrew language, Jewish history and tradition as well as Jewish practice and thought.
“Historians believe that northeastern Brazil is home to one of the largest concentrations of Bnai Anousim in the world,” said Shavei Israel Chairman Michael Freund. “Portuguese crypto-Jews arrived in Recife back in the 16th century, and there were said to be as many as 10 secret synagogues operating in the area.”
By the 1590s, the Inquisition began to operate in Recife, and many “secret Jews” were sent back to Lisbon, Portugal where they were burned at the stake for their beliefs, Freund said. “Nonetheless, countless others succeeded in preserving their Jewish identity, covertly passing it down through the generations until today, and it is our obligation to reach out to these people and to help them to return.”
The Center, he added, is named “Beit Aryeh” after Freund’s great-great-grandfather, Reb Aryeh Chaim Kottler z”l, “who was forced to leave his home in Russia together with his family to flee anti-Semitic persecution, just as the ancestors of the Bnai Anousim had to leave Spain and Portugal in order to escape their tormentors.”
In addition to Brazil, Shavei Israel currently has emissaries in Spain and Portugal working to facilitate the return of the Bnai Anousim to the Jewish people. It also operates Machon Miriam, a Spanish-language conversion institute in Jerusalem under the auspices of Israel’s Chief Rabbinate, where many Bnai Anousim complete their formal process of return to Judaism.
For more information, contact: office@shavei.org