So who am I?
José Antonio Sanes, a Sephardic Jew from Andalucia, Spain. My lineage is of rabbis who were learned men of the Torah and Talmud. I am a man of tradition. I firmly believe in the Jewish beliefs and law.
Would I, José, hold on to tradition and put my own son on trial?
We are Sephardic Jews! What is that? My father would teach me. He would tell me, “Hold on to God and tradition, for without it you’re not a people.”
As a child, I remembered my father, like his father, learning from the “ Geonim 
.” They were scholars of the two great Babylonian, Talmudic Academies of Sura Pumbedita (now known as Iraq). Geonim 
transmitted Torah Jewish law to their students, just as Moishe (Moses) did. My great-great-great grandfather was a Geonim 
. So do I hold on to tradition? Yes!
As a child, there were rituals; rituals that I had to learn. At times, it felt more like rituals and rules without a true relationship to the Almighty. That was something I had to deal with all of my life. We had to do what we did because my father and his father and his father did it. Their forefathers would hope that these external-imposed religious rites would create a relationship with God.
So the commandments without a relationship were null! I felt as a father that I had a relationship that was not null with God. How could I relate this knowledge, this tradition, to my son? I wish his mother, who had now passed away, would have shared this with him. As a father, I could pass on tradition and rituals, but my beloved, she could pass on a love of God that I could not.
My family immigrated to Puerto Rico, then to the United States in the early 1950s. We settled in Charleston, South Carolina.
How did we end up in America? All I could remember was that we lived in Spain. I grew up in the Province of Andalucia. I really don’t remember the town’s name. We had Spanish names and went to religious school in the mornings and public school in the afternoons. My surroundings were what I would call “normal.” I had Christian friends and, of course, Jewish friends. We celebrated the holidays at the synagogue and did our daily prayers and observed the Sabbath.
My favorite part of being a Jew was family; my Christian friends envied this.
My family and I moved to America when I was twelve. My father felt that it was time to move. Francisco Franco, known as El Caudillo, “the leader,” persecuted political opponents, repressed the culture and language of the Basque and Catalan regions, censored the media, and, according to my father, was ready to attack Jews. Inquisition or not, we were the next target. So it was time to move.
Franco became friends with Hitler and Mussolini to secure arms for his fight during the Spanish Civil War. This made life even more dangerous for Jews.
So we moved. We started life over. We eventually settled in Charleston, with all of its Southern trappings, with my great-uncle and my maternal great-grandmother Maria, who was a Jew converted to Catholicism.
The day I met my beloved would be one that I would never forget. We met at a wedding reception that we were attending. She was from Charleston; born and raised here. She was unlike anyone I had ever met. I had only dated several times, and only women in my religious circle.
And yet, here I was, a Jew at a wedding attracted to this light-haired, bronze-skinned Caucasian Southern girl. Her Southern charm was the least of my worries—the first glance did it all. I kept thinking to myself, “I am a Jew, attracted to a goy, a Gentile.” We would talk briefly that day, then I would see her again through mutual friends. My father didn’t know for a long time that I had developed feelings for this Southern Christian woman, but I was smitten!
Religion and tradition; somehow, I was to transmit my beliefs to her. We dated for a little bit before I met her parents. Her father was not thrilled at all that she was going out with a Jew. It was okay for her father to believe in Jesus, but dating a Jew was something that he could not swallow. But she handled it with grace.
Lisa was a college graduate and working as a teacher. I was starting law school, but we continued to correspond.
We finally spoke with my family about the relationship. She came to a family dinner on Friday night. They got along amazingly well. My father was of the belief that if this was serious, she would have to convert to Judaism. She would also change her name from Lisa to Luisa. This was part of her adaptation to the Spanish-Jewish culture. Her love for God saw no obstacle in conversion. She was a woman after God’s heart.
As I entered my last year in law school we decided to marry. But first, I had to pass the awful BAR exam. Then I had to find a job. Abuelo, my grandfather, a well-respected rabbi from Spain, saw no objection to us getting married. My father always looked to Abuelo for approval; he had learned to respect his father’s knowledge of the Torah and Talmud, but most of all he respected him.
My beloved went to conversion classes; she learned the ways of Judaism. She learned the most from Abuelo; my father did not know of this, nor was he to learn. You see, Abuelo was what we called the “Living Torah.” These rabbis knew the Torah forward and backward.
After she finished the conversion classes and I graduated from law school, we married. I was head over heels in love with this Southern woman. She had my heart and my love for eternity. We pledged our love for each other in front of many of our family and friends in a Jewish ceremony. It was a beautiful day, filled with love and laughter, and the promise of a future with lots of joy and blessings to come.
We Spanish Jews are a funny lot. We speak Ladino, a form of Spanish, and are full of tradition, from our language to our many customs. There are two types of Jews I came to learn. Spanish Jews and Ashkenazi 
Jews (from Eastern Europe). They were Jews, but they were different in those multiple sects of Judaism emerged from the Ashkenazi 
, but we remained pure. Who we were never changed.
Are we somewhat arrogant? Maybe yes, but we can thank the Spanish for the Inquisition and trying to destroy us over the centuries. But the reality was that they needed us. We were the civil servants of Spain, and without us the government and society would have collapsed. You may say no, but I say YES! Look back at history! The Inquisition of Jewish intelligence later on in history became the revolving door for acceptable murder by other cultures. Even to this day it still continues.
I’m reminded of talks with my Abuelo as he quoted, “YESHA’ YAHU” (Isaiah 2.4). “He will judge between the nations and arbitrate for many peoples. Then they will hammer their swords in plow blades and spears into pruning knives; nations will not raise swords at each other, and they will no longer learn war.” It wasn’t until later that I understood who “He” was who would judge the nations. For us Jews, it was the coming Messiah, and for Christians, it was Jesus.
That paradox. Is He the Messiah or not? As Abuelo would say, “Let your soul testifies if He is or not. For anyone can make an argument based on scripture to His authenticity or not. The Messiah will reveal Himself to your soul.” Here I was, learning the law and the Torah at the same time. How could I reconcile both and be a good Jew, a good husband, good father, and a good lawyer?