In spite of the papal bull and the repeated ordinances of the cities, Don Henry employed a Jewish farmer of taxes, one Don Chacon, a native of Vitoria; and he, too, fell a sacrifice to his office. A rabbi, Jacob Ibn-Nuñez, his private physician, was appointed by Henry to apportion and collect the tribute of the Jews of Castile; while Abraham Bibago, yet another Jew of eminence, stood high in the favor of John II of Aragon.
The example of the courts naturally affected the greater nobles, who, when their own interests were not concerned, troubled themselves very little about ecclesiastical edicts. The practice of medicine was still entirely in the hands of Jews, and opened to them the cabinets and the hearts of kings and nobles. It was in vain that papal bulls proclaimed that Christians should not employ Jewish physicians. There were few or no Christians who understood the healing art, and the sick had no recourse save to the skill of the Jews. Even the higher clergy had but little regard for the bulls of Eugenius, Nicholas, and Calixtus. They had too much care for the health of the flesh to refuse the medical aid of the Jews on account of a canonical decree. Most of the tyrannical restrictions belonging to the minority of John II and the times of the regent Catalina were completely forgotten. Only on one point did Henry insist with rigor. He would not permit the Jews to clothe themselves luxuriously. This was partly on account of his own preference for simplicity of dress, partly because he was desirous that the envy of Christians should not be excited against them. Under the mild rule of Don Henry, the Jews who had been more or less compulsorily baptized either returned to their faith, or at least observed the Jewish ritual unmolested. During the Feast of the Passover they lived upon rice entirely in order, on the one hand, to partake of nothing leavened, and, on the other, to avoid the suspicion of Judaism.
Hatred of the Jew, which burnt most fiercely in the great towns, naturally made it impossible for the orthodox to behold without indignation this favoritism towards the supposed enemies of their faith, and they made use of a weapon whose efficacy had been proved in other lands. The cry went forth: The Jews have put Christian children to death! Then came the report that "a Jew in the neighborhood of Salamanca had torn a child's heart out;" or, "Jews elsewhere have cut pieces of flesh out of a living Christian child," and so on. By means of such rumors, the fanaticism of the mob was speedily inflamed, the magistrates took up the matter, and the accused Jews were thrown into prison.