The Tortosa Disputation was the longest and most significant interfaith debate of the Middle Ages in the Iberian Peninsula, held between February 1413 and November 1414. It was convened by Pope Benedict XIII (known as Pope Luna) and actively promoted by Jerónimo de Santa Fe (a Jewish physician converted to Christianity, formerly known as Joshua Lorki). More than 20 rabbis and Jewish scholars from the main Jewish communities of the Crown of Aragon—such as Yosef Albo and Profiat Duran—participated, compelled to attend by papal mandate.Between 67 and 69 sessions were held over almost two years, primarily in Tortosa, with the final sessions taking place in the surrounding area. Meetings in San Mateo. After the devastating pogroms of 1391, the dispute marked a new turning point that fractured the Sephardic communities and led to numerous forced conversions or conversions due to social pressure. Pope Benedict XIII issued restrictive bulls that limited the autonomy of the Jewish communities and prohibited or censored rabbinical books and texts. Many historians consider it a decisive stage that weakened Hispanic Jewry demographically and economically on the road to the Edict of Expulsion of 1492.
