Greetings Friends,
Cactusjumper wrote:
In closing, I have never seen any original documents of Indian charges against the Jesuits. I have read the accounts of a number of such documents, and Jesuits using Indian labor for mining was never included.
It could, of course, have happened.
HOLA Joe, I am fairly certain there is such a record in which Indios made formal accusations of being forced to labor in Jesuit mines, in the testimony given to the Viceroy in the Yaqui, Pima, and Mayo Rebellion in Sinaloa and Sonora (1740?). The Viceroy and Archbishop Vizron approved the Yaqui demands for free elections, respect for land boundaries, that Yaquis must be paid for work and that they could not be forced to labor in the mines. I do not possess copies of the testimonies given before the Viceroy, and would be working with the Spanish-english dictionary anyway but am quite confident the document you seek is among them.
About the only "good" that could arise from proving this allegation beyond doubt is to prove the Society is either mistaken about the record, or deliberately lying, and for long, I could see
no possible gain from this result. It would change nothing, in my opinion, however it would serve to "prove a point" and maybe get some history texts edited and corrected. There are documents in Paraguay that include direct accusations of clandestine shipments of silver produced in the Jesuit mines being sent directly to Rome too, but that only is obliquely relevant to our discussion and the "hot button" topic of Jesuits, secret mines and treasures, slaves etc. I do
begin to understand your interest Joe, in trying to get the record correct, if for no reason other than to get history right, or even just a personal quest for the 'truth'. I have mis-understood your questions on this subject in the recent past as perhaps some personal bias, which is now clearly
not the case. I am "slow on the uptake" sometimes.. sorry to admit!
Unless I have again gotten your position wrong!
if so just give me a kick....
I re-read my previous post (yesterday, above) and speaking of "
poor choice of words" that message could certainly have been said with more courtesy, my apologies for the rude reply - ran out of meds a few days ago and was tired & cranky.
Not a good time to be writing out messages to friends, if I wish to KEEP them!
I will try to avoid such in future.
Real de Tayopa wrote:
Actually there can be a no. of reasons why Jesuits were not personally accused.
The obvious one, and the one which has been directly alluded to by Indios, or at least their direct descendants, is
to keep the mines as secret as possible, in fact efforts were taken during the revolts to conceal the very existence of the mines
so as to avoid the enslavement of being forced to work in them. I have to agree too, that when we say "Jesuits" most people often instantly assume we are speaking of priests, when in reality there are "jesuits" whom are
not ordained priests but still are Jesuits, and work for the benefit of the Order and the Church. So it seems a miscarriage to claim the Jesuits were mining, if one considers
only the obvious priests to be the whole of the Jesuits, when those who were most engaged in the activities (and I would not exclude ALL of the priests either) were
not ordained priests. However as you pointed out Jose', to the Indios, seeing both types of Jesuits live in the same homes, pray together, etc it seems unlikely that they would have differentiated between the good padre who took their confessions and baptised their daughters, and those who directed their labors in the fields and mines - especially since the ordained priest also directed field works and judging whom needed punishments.
Good luck and good hunting, I hope you all find the treasures that you seek.
your friend,
Roy ~ Oroblanco
