Sephardic Jews, also known as Sephardi Jews or Sephardim, and rarely as Iberian Peninsula Jews, are a Jewish diaspora population associated with the historic Jewish communities of the Iberian Peninsula and their descendants.
The term "Sephardic" comes from Sepharad, the Hebrew word for Iberia. These communities flourished for centuries in Iberia until they (along with Spanish Muslims) were expelled in the late 15th century by the Christians. Over time, Sephardic has also come to refer more broadly to the diverse Jewish peoples, particularly in the Middle East and North Africa, who adopted Sephardic religious customs and legal traditions (often due to the influences of exiles). Sephardic Jews form a major component of the global Jewish population, with a high percentage of the Sephardic-Jewish population now living in Israel.
The earliest documented Jewish presence in the Iberian Peninsula dates to the Roman period, beginning in the first centuries CE. After facing persecution under the pagan and later Christian Visigothic Kingdom, Jewish communities flourished for centuries under Muslim rule in Al-Andalus following the Umayyad conquest (711–720s), a period often seen as a golden age. Their status declined under the Almoravid and Almohad dynasties and during the Christian Reconquista. In 1391, anti-Jewish riots in Castile and Aragon led to massacres and mass forced conversions. In 1492, the Alhambra Decree by the Catholic Monarchs expelled Jews from Spain, and in 1496, King Manuel I of Portugal issued a similar edict. These events led to migrations, forced conversions, and executions.
Sephardic Jews widely dispersed throughout the Mediterranean basin. Many found refuge throughout the Ottoman Empire, settling in such cities as Istanbul, Salonica, and İzmir; even more Sephardic Jews found refuge in the Mediterranean Maghreb — settling in Tétouan, Fez, Algiers, and Tunis, forming a major Sephardic population: the Maghrebi Jews.“A History of the Jews in North Africa: Volume 1 From Antiquity to the Sixteenth Century.” H. Z. (J. W.) Hirschberg. BRILL, Feb 26, 2024.
Some Sephardim also settled in Italian ports including Venice and Livorno, as well as in parts of the Balkans, and the Levant (notably Safed). Small communities settled in the Netherlands (notably Amsterdam) and the coast of Germany (especially Hamburg). Smaller communities also emerged in France, England, and the Americas, where Sephardim often played key roles in commerce and diplomacy.
Historically, the vernacular languages of the Sephardic Jews and their descendants have been variants of either Spanish, Catalan or Portuguese, although they have also adopted and adapted other languages. These variants are academically called Judaeo-Spanish (or ladino), Judaeo-Catalan (or katalaní) and Judaeo-Portuguese (aljamiado português). The variant called ladino is a Romance language derived from Old Spanish and Old Portuguese that was spoken by the eastern Sephardic Jews who settled in the Eastern Mediterranean after their expulsion from Spain in 1492. In the former provinces of the Ottoman Empire, Ladino is also referred to as djudezmo. The gestation and development of Ladino can be compared to that of Yiddish in Germany, among Ashkenazi Jews of central and eastern European origin. However, Ladino must not be confused with the Ladin language that is spoken in the Austrian and Italian Alps. The Sephardic linguistic repertoire is dovetailed with Haketia (also known as "Tetuani Ladino"), an Arabic-influenced variety of Judaeo-Spanish, which was spoken by North African Sephardic Jews who settled in the region after the 1492 Spanish expulsion.
Spanish and Portuguese nationalities In 2015, more than five centuries after the expulsion, both Spain and Portugal enacted laws allowing Sephardic Jews who could prove their ancestral origins in those countries to apply for citizenship. By allowing dual nationalities, the purpose of such statutes was to offer a collective form of historical reparation for the harm inflicted on the Jewish forebears of the distant past, to their descendants of the present day. The preamble to the Spanish legislation expressly recognized the Sephardic fidelity and indelible sense of belonging to Sepharad, while commending their preservation of language, memories and cultural traditions across the many generations that lived in exile.
The Spanish law that offered citizenship to descendants of Sephardic Jews expired in 2019, although subsequent extensions were granted by the Spanish government —due to the COVID-19 pandemic— in order to file pending documents and sign delayed declarations before a notary in Spain. The last opportunity to complete existing Sephardic applications for Spanish nationality was on September 1, 2021. After that date, new Sephardic applicants may still try to petition the Spanish government directly for carta de naturaleza —in the hope of obtaining a discretionary decision by the Council of Ministers— or resort to the alternative 2-year legal residency pathway to citizenship.
In the case of Portugal, the nationality law was modified in 2022 and again in 2024 with very stringent requirements for new Sephardic applicants, effectively ending the possibility of successful applications without evidence of a personal travel history to Portugal —which is tantamount to prior permanent residency— or ownership of inherited property or concerns on Portuguese soil. In May 2026, the Assembly of the Republic (Portuguese Parliament) further amended the nationality law by enforcing the 3-year legal permanent residency requirement on previous Sephardic applicants, ultimately closing the distinct Sephardic pathway to Portuguese citizenship altogether.
Etymology The name Sephardi means "Iberian" or "Hispanic," derived from Sepharad (), a Biblical location.Obadiah, 1–20 : And the captivity of this host of the children of Israel shall possess that of the Canaanites, even unto Zarephath; and the captivity of Jerusalem, which is in Sepharad, shall possess the cities of the south. (King James Version) The location of the Biblical Sepharad points to the Iberian peninsula, then the westernmost outpost of Phoenician maritime trade.Strabo, Geography, III.2, 14-15. Marta García Morcillo, "Patterns of trade and economy in Strabo's Geography", in: The Routledge Companion to Strabo, Taylor & Francis (2017), chapter 12. Jewish presence in Iberia is believed to have started during the reign of King Solomon, whose excise imposed taxes on Iberian exiles. Although the first date of arrival of Jews in Iberia is the subject of ongoing archaeological research, there is evidence of established Jewish communities as early as the 1st century CE.Bowers, W. P. "Jewish Communities in Spain in the Time of Paul the Apostle", Journal of Theological Studies, Vol. 26, Part 2 (October 1975) p. 395.
Modern transliteration of Hebrew romanizes the consonant פ (pe without a dagesh dot placed in its center) as the digraph ph, in order to represent fe or the single phoneme /f/, the English sound that is voiceless labiodental fricative. In other languages and scripts, "Sephardi" may be translated as plural ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; , ; and .
Definition
Narrow ethnic definition In the narrower ethnic definition, a Sephardic Jew is one descended from the Jews who lived in the Iberian Peninsula in the late 15th century, immediately prior to the issuance of the Alhambra Decree of 1492 by order of the Catholic Monarchs in Spain, and the decree of 1496 in Portugal by order of King Manuel I.
In Hebrew, the term "Sephardim Tehorim" (, literally "Pure Sephardim"), derived from a misunderstanding of the initials ס"ט "Samekh Tet" traditionally used with some proper names (which stand for sofo tov, "may his end be good" or "sin v'tin", "mire and mud" has in recent times been used in some quarters to distinguish Sephardim proper, "who trace their lineage back to the Iberian/Spanish population", from Sephardim in the broader religious sense.Mintz, Alan L. The Boom in Contemporary Israeli Fiction. University Press of New England (Hanover, NH, USA). 1997. p115 This distinction has also been made in reference to 21st-century genetic findings in research on 'Pure Sephardim', in contrast to other communities of Jews today who are part of the broad classification of Sephardi.
Ethnic Sephardic Jews have had a presence in North Africa and various parts of the Mediterranean and Western Asia due to their expulsion from Spain. There have also been Sephardic communities in South America and India.
Katalanim Originally, Jews spoke of Sefarad referring to Al-Andalus and not the entire peninsula, nor as it is understood today, in which the term Sefarad is used in modern Hebrew to refer to Iberia. This has caused a long misunderstanding, since traditionally the entire Iberian Diaspora has been included in a single group. But the historiographical research reveals that that word, seen as homogeneous, was actually divided into distinct groups: the Sephardim, coming from the countries of the Castilian crown, Castilian language speakers, and the / Katalaní, originally from the Crown of Aragon, Judeo-Catalan speakers.Pons, Marc, La diáspora judeocatalana: ¿sefardíes o katalanim? eSefarad. 2021. https://esefarad.com/?p=108306
Broad religious definition
The modern Israeli Hebrew definition of Sephardi is a much broader, religious based, definition that generally excludes ethnic considerations. In its most basic form, this broad religious definition of a Sephardi refers to any Jew, of any ethnic background, who follows the customs and traditions of Sepharad. For religious purposes, and in modern Israel, "Sephardim" is most often used in this wider sense. It encompasses most non-Ashkenazi Jews who are not ethnically Sephardi, but are in most instances of West Asian or North African origin. They are classified as Sephardi because they commonly use a Sephardic style of liturgy; this constitutes a majority of Mizrahi Jews in the 21st century.
The term Sephardi in the broad sense, describes the nusach (Hebrew language, "liturgical tradition") used by Sephardic Jews in their Siddur (prayer book). A nusach is defined by a liturgical tradition's choice of prayers, order of prayers, text of prayers and melodies used in the singing of prayers. Sephardim traditionally pray using Minhag Sefarad.
The term Nusach Sefard or Nusach Sfarad does not refer to the liturgy generally recited by Sephardim proper or even Sephardi in a broader sense, but rather to an alternative Eastern European liturgy used by many Hasidim, who are Ashkenazi.
Additionally, Ethiopian Jews, whose branch of practiced Judaism is known as Haymanot, have been included under the oversight of Israel's already broad Sephardic Chief Rabbinate.
History in Spain and Portugal
Arrival and early history The earliest significant Jewish presence in the Iberian Peninsula is typically traced back to the Roman period, during the first centuries CE. Evidence includes an amphora discovered in Ibiza, stamped with two Hebrew letters in relief, indicating possible trade between Judaea and the Balearics in the first century. Additionally, the Epistle to the Romans records Paul's intent to visit Spain,Epistle to the Romans, 15.28 hinting at a Jewish community in the region during the mid-first century CE. Josephus writes that Herod Antipas was deposed and exiled to Spain, possibly to Lugdunum Convenarum, in 39 CE.