veh at a pace of twenty miles (seven leagues) per day. He also used Hosea
to justify their treatment by the Spaniards, the first instance in which the
biblical text, promising punishment for the ten tribes, was used to justify the
dispossession of Native Americans. Bartolome ́de las Casas, a major proponent
of the Indians’ human rights, refuted the theory but to no avail; it gained more
purchase with Dura ́n.
A Dominican friar probably of Jewish descent, Dura ́n was one of the most
vocal early proponents of the idea that the American Indians were the ten
tribes.^105 Born in Spain and raised in Mexico, Dura ́n acquired a great deal of
knowledge about America’s natives and their languages. Dura ́n’s key goal was
to establish that the Spanish colonization of the Americas was part of a divine
plan,^106 and he declared that understanding the origins of the American
Indians was a work of “divine revelation.” Proving that the Native Americans
were members of the “Hebrew people” was supported by the sacred scrip-
ture.^107 A key feature in his account is the natives’ “inclination to idolatry,” held
up as proof of their connection to the ten tribes, which are condemned in the
Bible for their idolatry. God, Dura ́n reminded his readers, promised the tribes
the “most rigorous punishment” for their “great evil deeds and abomina-
tions.”^108 However, as Kadir rightly points out, Dura ́n’s interest in identifying
the American Indians with the ten tribes was not just a scriptural exercise. He
was “explicit in remarks that not only proclaim the Indians to be Jewish, but
serve the unmistakable purpose of justifying the Conquest.”^109 Linking the
Native Americans with the ten tribes helped to justify the Spanish conquest of
the Americas and its horrors. The conquerors were merely serving as the hand
of God. Dura ́n’s theories about the ten tribes in America were based on
scriptural interpretations and driven by political and theological considera-
tions. This was not the first time that political and theological considerations
used the story of the ten tribes, nor was it the last. But Dura ́n’s justification of
the advent of empire and its horrible consequences is probably the most
blatant example.
Dura ́n was familiar with the criticisms of Spanish attitudes toward Amer-
ican Indians. The first to voice them, in a spectacular speech in 1511 , was
another Dominican friar, Antonio de Montesinos (not to be confused with
Aharon ha-Levi). Standing at the podium in Santo Domingo Church, Hispa-
niola, the friar promised the Spaniards “hell” for what they were doing in
America. The sermon was recorded and relayed back to Spain by las Casas,
who was greatly influenced by Montesinos.^110 The idea of punishment for the
Spaniards resonates strongly in the story of Antonio Montezinos/ha-Levi over a
century later, which tells of an encounter with the hidden and embattled ten
tribes, who suffered terribly in the wake of the Spanish invasion. Their return,
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