Jewish passivity, which so irritated Ibn Verga, was a matter of faith: ‘For they believe that any recognizable change which relates to them . . . derives from a higher cause and not human effort.’8 Many Jews were disturbed at the time by the failure of the huge and once wealthy and powerful Spanish community to offer any resistance to their cruel expulsion. Some pointed to the contrast with Jewish bellicosity in antiquity; why could not Jews be more like their ancestor, Mordecai?
