Spain's Holy Week

Pagan roots, Catholic theology, Muharram, Ganesh Chaturthi, Japanese construction workers and the Ku Klux Clan.

There is something elemental about Easter in Spain. It is as far a cry from bunnies and chocolate covered eggs, as Santa Klaus is from Jesus Christ.[1]

Semana Santa (Holy Week) plays out across Spanish cities over seven days - from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday - in candlelight processions led by hooded penitents, hauling floats of enormous wooden idols through medieval streets, to the steady beat of drummers.

And amidst the swirling currents of this most Catholic of cultural expressions there are glimpses of Islam, paganism, and even Hinduism, to be had - if you have the eyes to see them. For Easter in Spain bears the imprints of the cultural mélange - Arabic, Hebrew and Gypsy – that lies under the surface of the country. It is a substructure long layered over by the debris of Catholicism, modernity and secularism, but exposed every once in a while, as during Holy Week.

We happened to be in Zafra during the celebrations, a little-known town in the southwestern province of Badajoz. It is fairly typical for the region – dominated by a 15th century fortress and complete with church, town square and a network of narrow streets lined with high-walled homes. The town is best known as the birthplace of the 16th-century priest and chess maestro, Ruy López de Segura, of the Ruy Lopez opening fame.

A few candles already lit the gloaming as we shuffled through the crowds to get as close to the entrance of the church as possible. Ghostly figures shrouded in white robes, red capes and pointed hoods with slits only for the eyes, came streaming out of the doors.

Semana Santa procession in Zafra. Credit: Pallavi Aiyar

It was a shocking sight to me at first, because the clothing was so reminiscent of the white-supremacist Ku Klux Clan. In fact, these robes predate the Clan by centuries. The conical head gear known as a capirote were first prescribed in Spain by the holy office of the Inquisition. Men and women arrested on suspicion of heresy had to wear a paper capirote in public as a mark of humiliation.

Semana Santa procession in Zafra. Credit: Pallavi Aiyar

In time, the hood was adopted by the cofradia, or Catholic brotherhoods, so that their members could remain anonymous when they took to the streets to whip themselves bloody, in penance for their sins, in a very Muharram-like display of religious fervour. Although self-flagellation as a part of religious processions was eventually banned in 1777, in practice it continued till well into the 20th century.

The penitents, or nazarenos, in Zafra were thankfully whip-free, but many walked barefoot despite the spring-chill. Others carried wooden crosses on their shoulders. Suffering remained a conspicuous motif of the procession.

Directly behind the first contingent of penitents, the paso, or float, emerged from the church to wild cheers from the onlookers. It was an enormous structure, with a life-sized idol of Jesus Christ on the cross, his face frozen in grief. Every Spanish town has its own paso, which range from the simple to the highly ornate. The vast majority feature either Christ or the Virgin Mary. Most weigh a ton or two.

Celebration of Semana Santa in Malaga. Pic credit

About 40 people are required to hoist a paso on their heads. The carriers, called costaleros, stand directly under the tableaux and are hidden by fabric that covers falls on either side of the float. Only their feet are visible to onlookers.

To bear the weight of the pasos, costaleros tie protective gear around their heads to an effect that put me in mind of construction workers in Japan.

Spanish costalero. Pic credit: Jorge Fernandez

Japanese Construction Worker (Image credit: https://www.nippon.com/en/images/i00045/)

But more than Japan, the semana santa processions reminded me of Hindu festivals like Ganesh Chaturthi, where idols of the elephant God are carried by processions through the streets of cities and eventually immersed in the sea.

Ganesh Visarjan (Immersion) procession in India. Credit: Snehal Jeevan Pailkar

There was in fact one incident in 2017, when a group of Hindus carrying an idol of Ganesha were welcomed into a church in the Spanish city of Ceuta, with the gathered Christian congregation bursting into spontaneous hymns to welcome it.[2]

(You can watch a video of the event here: Ganesha in Cuenta. Watch it in particular from 20 minutes on)

Semana santa is heady stuff. I’d never imagined a brew with ingredients that included pagan roots, Catholic theology, Muharram-style flagellation, Ganesh Chaturthi-reminiscent processions, and outfits resonant of both Japanese construction workers and the Ku Klux Clan!

But the true marvel of the evening in Zafra was the accompanying music: a haunting mix of brass and drums.

I spent the next few days immersed in saetas. These are songs of lament sung during breaks in the processions, usually without any musical accompaniment. The word saeta means “arrow” in Spanish, referring to the way in which the song soars through the air, piercing the hearts of its listeners.

Music historians believe the song originated in late medieval monastic canticles, but later, the musical structure of the saeta broke free and was reshaped by Jewish converts to Catholicism in the sixteenth century. While some of these Jewish Catholic songs may have expressed genuine devotion to a newly embraced Christianity, others were coded expressions of the singer’s sorrow at having been forced to renounce, on pain of exile or death, their former faith.

The saeta was further developed by Spanish gypsies (gitanos), who have emerged as the music’s most popular interpreters today. Gitanos, of which there are upwards of 750,000 in Spain, do not have a well-documented history. But they are believed to have entered the Iberian peninsula during the 15th century. Linguistic analysis shows that they originated in northwestern India and migrated westwards in waves, between 300 BC and AD 600.

Gitanos have brought to the saeta elements of flamenco, music which at its core is also a lament against discrimination and prejudice. For the gitanos, Jesus Christ has become a symbol of their pain. The embrace of Spanish Catholicism by gypsies is a subversive act of appropriation that is little appreciated, even in Spain.

Consider this verse from a saeta:

Ya a viene el Cristo moreno (Here comes the dark-skinned Christ)
el Señor de los gitanos (Lord of the gypsies)
el mas grande y el mas gueno. (The highest and holiest)
Apretaitas las manos (With hands bound)
Pobre Jesús Nazareno.(Poor Jesus of Nazareth)

You can watch a saeta being sung during a semana santa procession in Seville here.(To the Indians reading this - tell me if it reminds you of a raga?)

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In Spain, the week-long festivities have come to an end, the idols are back at rest in their churches, and the nazarenos and casteleros have returned to their day jobs as accountants or truck drivers. But I am left awash in wonder, listening to saetas and marveling at this Global Jigsaw of a world.

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Much love,

Hasta la proxima semana,

Un abrazo fuerte,

Pallavi

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[1] Although there is a persistent urban legend that a Japanese department store once created a shop front display with a Sata Claus nailed to a cross!

[2] Sadly, the priest who allowed the Ganesha statue into the church was forced to resign.