Jewish organizations from the United States and Spanish-speaking countries are protesting to the Royal Spanish Academy (known in Spanish as the Real Academia Española, or RAE) that it officially defines in its dictionary "Jew" (Judío) as "a greedy, miserly, or usurious person", and the synonym for Jew as "a vile trick or an action that harms someone".
In a letter obtained by Ynet and backed by the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles, the Anti-Defamation League and about 20 other Jewish groups and communities from Spanish-speaking countries such as Spain and Panama, the signatories call on the Academy to change its "outdated, anti-Semitic and completely contrary to the Spanish Constitution'' definition.
"The definitions of the words Judío and Judiada in no way reflect the true meaning of these terms," the letter reads. "These descriptions are the product of terminology from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance that originate from rejection, envy, and hatred directed towards the Jews who, because of their work, had the highest income - which was one of the factors that led to their expulsion from Spain by the Catholic Monarchy."
The official academy dictionary explains the term Judío under five different definitions: the first four are uncontroversial and refer to people of the Jewish faith or descendants of "Judah". But the fifth definition caused an uproar and claims of anti-Semitism, according to which Judío is "a greedy, greedy person or usurer."
The second definition of Judiada in the lexicon interprets it as "a crowd or group of Jews", but the first and controversial one ("a vile trick") comes with a warning that the word was originally used "with anti-Semitic intent".
The signatories agree that the academy tried to explain in its definition that the use of words like Judío in the meaning of "a greedy person or moneylender" is derogatory, but they noted that "from the point of view of the international Jewish community, the definition is only used to confirm that we are dealing here with an incorrect definition that feeds anti-Semitism and harms the image of the Jews by condemning them as a group of greedy people or moneylenders. Such definitions belong to the tradition of anti-Semitism in Spain that led to the expulsion or forced conversion of the country's Jewish population in 1492 by the Catholic royal house of Ferdinand and Isabella."
A similar incident has been reported by i24 NEWS, in which Google defined Jew as an offensive way to refer to haggling or bargaining in a miserly fashion.
The RAE, or in its official name the Royal Spanish Academy, was founded more than 300 years ago in Madrid by the Spanish Royal House with the aim of regulating and determining the laws of the Spanish language. The Union of Jewish Federations in Spain previously protested to the Academy for its definition of Judiada as "an evil action that is considered, biased, to belong to the Jews." It was slightly changed, but the definition today, as mentioned, remains similar.