The oldest and most well-known Jew in Mexico, Don Francisco Rivas Puigcerver, writer, teacher, soldier and scholar. died on the morning of October 17, leaving behind him a beautiful memory, a magnificent library and two old servants who can not cease grieving for him.
Don Pancho, as he was known to all intellectual Mexico, was born in the state of Campeche, where settled in the colonial period many of the Jews who were banished from Spain by the Holy Tribunal of the Inquisition, and who came to America almost immediately after the conquest. The ancestor of Rivas, by name Abrabanel, a historian of the royal court of Spain, refused to hide his religion as was necessary to escape the torture chambers of the tribunal, and fled to the western continent, setting in Campeche and changing his name to Abrabaya.
Don Pancho at a very early age was sent to New York to study, where he remained several years. Upon his return he found a revolution brewing against President Lerdo, and being “a hot-headed young rebel, like a true Jew.” as he said, he joined the scattered troops and took command of a group of ragged, ill-armed men.
He had a very beautiful love-story, having courted his wife, a Cuban descended also from Spanish Jews, for twelve years, and having won her in the very teeth of her family’s opposition.
Don Pancho lived in Tacubaya, one of the suburbs of Mexico City, near the “Street of Lost Souls”, said to be haunted by the ghosts of the Jews killed by the Inquisition, and across the street from one of the headquarters of the Holy Tribunal. He taught Greek and French in the National Preparatory School and in the University of Mexico. He also wrote many translations from Hebrew into Spanish, one of which, the Song of Songs, according to a high colleague of his, “is worth its weight in ground gold.” He knew Hebrew and wrote it, to the envy of the few rabbis that have been in Mexico. He knew Greek, Latin, Spanish, English, French, German, and could converse with either the western or oriental Jewish immigrants in their own dialects.
He belonged to the Sephardim congregation of Mexico, a synagogue long established. Among his pupils can be counted Adolfo de la Huerta, former secretary of Treasury and leader of the recent rebellion, Ezequiel Chavez, rector of the University, Antonio Caso, the leader of the Mexican school of “mystic” philosophy; and practically all the well-known writers and statesmen of Mexico today. “Half of Mexico was taught by a Jew”, he used to say, “and they don’t even know it.” But what they did know was that he was a most lucid teacher, and the intimate relations between him and his pupils made his name a tradition after he ceased teaching and was retired by the government on a life pension. The name of “El Maestro”-the Master-was universally applied to him, at the same time that the edge of pomposity was taken from this title by its parallel “Papa Rivas.”
His library, composed of something like ten thousand volumes, bears almost entirely on Jewish subjects. There are rare books and manuscripts relating to cases of Jews tried by the Mexican Inquisition. There are books in Hebrew and books in Ladino, which is Spanish written with Hebrew characters. He had books in Arabic, and many of the writings of the medieval rabbis, some books dealing with the kabalists.
“The Master” was buried beside his wife, in the ##ave he himself had purchased. His house, his ##wers and his dogs remain exactly as they were. Only the old woman, Dominga, does not go into the book-room at twilight to light the lamp and talk about the old days “when Maria was alive.” But the favorite dog still sleeps at the foot of the narrow iron bed.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
