Jewish Existence in a Berber Environment
Moshe Shokeid
in Jewish Societies in the Middle East, ed. by Shlomo Deshen and P. Zenner,
Washington DC, University Press of America, 1982, p. 107
Washington DC, University Press of America, 1982, p. 107
This text by Moshe Shokeid, Professor of Anthropology at Tel Aviv University, uses oral accounts given by Atlas Mountain Jews, about years after they immigrated to Israel. It focuses on the communities of the tribal hinterland. Shokeid draws from the testimonies of people who had experience as merchants, peddlers, and itinerant craftsmen among the Berbers, and who interacted with their patrons and other neighbors. The data is used in conjunction with written sources to elaborate the picture of the Moroccan Jewish condition.
During the l970s historians, sociologists and anthropologists assessed diversely the Jewish situation in Morocco. Polar answers were given to the question whether Jews were a persecuted minority forced to comply rigidly with the more humiliating and severe dhimmi regulations, or whether their relationships with the surrounding Muslim society were relatively congenial, particularly when compared with European Jewry.
The Moroccan debate cannot be isolated from an assessment of the general scene of Jewish life in Muslim lands, which was permeated with the ambiguity engendered by the dhimmi status. That official charter of rights and obligations, applied to Jews and Christians alike, has given rise to contrasting and inconsistent descriptions and interpretations of tolerance versus oppression in Islamic society. Chouraqui was one of the first to emphasize the relatively harmonious elements in Jewish-Muslim relations in Morocco (1958: 54-5), and the controversy gained momentum when Rosen formulated his hypothesis for the sociological raison d’être of these harmonious relationships.
This approach to the Jewish situation in Morocco has been challenged by Stillman as idealizing the Jewish position and distorting the general Moroccan scene through the application of a hypothesis pertinent mainly to the Sefrou case. Stillman reinforced his argument with historical and folkloric sources which depict the humble and vulnerable legal and social position of Moroccan Jews. Pointing to the pariah status of Moroccan Jews, Stillman contends that they were excluded from many trades and consequently forced into occupations forbidden to Muslims, such as gold and silversmithing and the particularly despised occupation of moneylending. Stillman also cites records, and brings evidence as to the persecution of Jews. Against the background of these contradictory opinions, Meyers propounds that there has never been a single paradigm of Muslim-Jewish relations in Morocco. During different periods, as well as in different parts of the country, various patterns predominated, exhibiting different types of co-existence. According to this view, both Rosen and Stillman present only a partial perspective of a situation that is far more complex. An inquiry into the ambiguity of patterns and the general ambivalence in Muslim-Jewish relationships we find in Goldberg’s analysis of the Mimuna ceremony, and this ambivalence of relationships forms the theme of many Jewish Moroccan folktales, in which contacts with non-Jews are tense and contentious.
My own investigation into the particular situation of Atlas Mountains Jews revealed that most of the writers who explored Jewish life under Berber rule in recent generations comment on the Jews’ relative safety, emphasizing the cordial relationships with their neighbors. Some of these writers refer to symbiotic relationships between Jews and Berbers. Flamand concentrates on the economic dimension of this symbiosis ; Willner, on the other hand, comments in general: ‘The Jews of Ait Ardar lived in virtual symbiosis with their Berber neighbors, and enjoyed excellent relations with them and a high subsistence level’ (1969: 263). These descriptions seem surprising considering the unstable political situation and the more difficult environmental circumstances of Berber tribal areas. The skeptic may query whether the mere fact that Jews continued to survive under Berber rule did not give rise to these idealized descriptions.
Whatever our conclusions on the Jewish situation in the Atlas Mountains and elsewhere, an important factor to be considered, both in past and possibly future debates is that most of the studies and assessments on Jewish-Muslim relationships have been canned out after the majority of Moroccan Jewry immigrated to Israel or elsewhere. This factor inevitably circumscribed investigation, not only in studies of communities which do not have many written records (particularly communities from southern Morocco), but in other communities as well. Moreover, the collective and individual Jewish experience of the twentieth century, particularly the Holocaust, Israeli statehood and, in its wake, mass immigration from Middle Eastern and North African countries might have colored, in various ways, the views both of Moroccan-born Jews and of those who informed about, or analyzed, the situation of Jews in Morocco.
The arguments of the above scientists and our specific reservations evince a problem rarely treated directly by the various disciplines, namely the interpretative dimension in the presentation and analysis of data. The issue was tackled in anthropology by Geertz (1973: 3-32) who exemplified his argument with observations he recorded in Morocco. The dramatis personae in his case were a Jewish trader from the highlands of central Morocco, his patron - a Berber sheikh - robbers from a neighboring Berber tribe who had attacked the trader and his guests, and a French colonial officer. The latter, anxious to enforce French law and order, messed up settlement of the dispute according to Berber custom, which would have granted the Jewish trader considerable indemnification in sheep by the attacker’s tribe.
Discussing the quality of interpretation embedded in the presentation and analysis of observed or recorded behavior, Geertz claimed:
During the l970s historians, sociologists and anthropologists assessed diversely the Jewish situation in Morocco. Polar answers were given to the question whether Jews were a persecuted minority forced to comply rigidly with the more humiliating and severe dhimmi regulations, or whether their relationships with the surrounding Muslim society were relatively congenial, particularly when compared with European Jewry.
The Moroccan debate cannot be isolated from an assessment of the general scene of Jewish life in Muslim lands, which was permeated with the ambiguity engendered by the dhimmi status. That official charter of rights and obligations, applied to Jews and Christians alike, has given rise to contrasting and inconsistent descriptions and interpretations of tolerance versus oppression in Islamic society. Chouraqui was one of the first to emphasize the relatively harmonious elements in Jewish-Muslim relations in Morocco (1958: 54-5), and the controversy gained momentum when Rosen formulated his hypothesis for the sociological raison d’être of these harmonious relationships.
This approach to the Jewish situation in Morocco has been challenged by Stillman as idealizing the Jewish position and distorting the general Moroccan scene through the application of a hypothesis pertinent mainly to the Sefrou case. Stillman reinforced his argument with historical and folkloric sources which depict the humble and vulnerable legal and social position of Moroccan Jews. Pointing to the pariah status of Moroccan Jews, Stillman contends that they were excluded from many trades and consequently forced into occupations forbidden to Muslims, such as gold and silversmithing and the particularly despised occupation of moneylending. Stillman also cites records, and brings evidence as to the persecution of Jews. Against the background of these contradictory opinions, Meyers propounds that there has never been a single paradigm of Muslim-Jewish relations in Morocco. During different periods, as well as in different parts of the country, various patterns predominated, exhibiting different types of co-existence. According to this view, both Rosen and Stillman present only a partial perspective of a situation that is far more complex. An inquiry into the ambiguity of patterns and the general ambivalence in Muslim-Jewish relationships we find in Goldberg’s analysis of the Mimuna ceremony, and this ambivalence of relationships forms the theme of many Jewish Moroccan folktales, in which contacts with non-Jews are tense and contentious.
My own investigation into the particular situation of Atlas Mountains Jews revealed that most of the writers who explored Jewish life under Berber rule in recent generations comment on the Jews’ relative safety, emphasizing the cordial relationships with their neighbors. Some of these writers refer to symbiotic relationships between Jews and Berbers. Flamand concentrates on the economic dimension of this symbiosis ; Willner, on the other hand, comments in general: ‘The Jews of Ait Ardar lived in virtual symbiosis with their Berber neighbors, and enjoyed excellent relations with them and a high subsistence level’ (1969: 263). These descriptions seem surprising considering the unstable political situation and the more difficult environmental circumstances of Berber tribal areas. The skeptic may query whether the mere fact that Jews continued to survive under Berber rule did not give rise to these idealized descriptions.
Whatever our conclusions on the Jewish situation in the Atlas Mountains and elsewhere, an important factor to be considered, both in past and possibly future debates is that most of the studies and assessments on Jewish-Muslim relationships have been canned out after the majority of Moroccan Jewry immigrated to Israel or elsewhere. This factor inevitably circumscribed investigation, not only in studies of communities which do not have many written records (particularly communities from southern Morocco), but in other communities as well. Moreover, the collective and individual Jewish experience of the twentieth century, particularly the Holocaust, Israeli statehood and, in its wake, mass immigration from Middle Eastern and North African countries might have colored, in various ways, the views both of Moroccan-born Jews and of those who informed about, or analyzed, the situation of Jews in Morocco.
The arguments of the above scientists and our specific reservations evince a problem rarely treated directly by the various disciplines, namely the interpretative dimension in the presentation and analysis of data. The issue was tackled in anthropology by Geertz (1973: 3-32) who exemplified his argument with observations he recorded in Morocco. The dramatis personae in his case were a Jewish trader from the highlands of central Morocco, his patron - a Berber sheikh - robbers from a neighboring Berber tribe who had attacked the trader and his guests, and a French colonial officer. The latter, anxious to enforce French law and order, messed up settlement of the dispute according to Berber custom, which would have granted the Jewish trader considerable indemnification in sheep by the attacker’s tribe.
Discussing the quality of interpretation embedded in the presentation and analysis of observed or recorded behavior, Geertz claimed:
|
"What it means is that descriptions of Berber, Jewish or French culture must be cast in terms of the constructions we imagine Berbers, Jews or Frenchmen to place upon what they live through, the formulae they use to define what happens to them... They must be cast in terms of the interpretations to which persons of a particular denomination subject their experience, because that is what they profess to be descriptions of." (1973:15)
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In analyzing my own data, I was constantly aware of the limitations in the study of the Jewish Moroccan situation. Through the experiences of a community from the Atlas Mountains transplanted to an Israeli village, which I called Romema [1], I tentatively suggest some interpretations for the position of Jews in these parts of Morocco. My observations in Romema were carried out over a period of 18 months - from October 1965 to March 1967, and for three months during the summer of 1976. The people of Romema migrated to Israel in 1956 from a village, which I named Amran, located in the district of Ait Bou Oulli [2], about 50 kilometers southeast of Demnate.
I refrain from discussing the patterns of social and cultural life of Atlas Mountains Jews and possible cultural symbiotic elements with the surrounding Berber society [3]. Rather I concentrate on the basic material circumstances of their lives - residence, occupation, and safety. The present anthropological study will, I hope, further contribute to the descriptive and analytical spectrum of Jewish life in Morocco, through its assessment of the Jewish situation in some parts of the Atlas Mountains.
The circumstances of Jewish life in Amran
When I began to summarize my data on the relationships of the people of Amran with their neighbors (Shokeid, 1971/1985. 18-23), I realized that these could not be defined in clear-cut terms. The immigrants’ spontaneous stories and discussions as well as their answers to my direct questions were sometimes reminiscent of the pathetic descriptions of the position of Atlas Mountains Jews by nineteenth and early twentieth-century travelers and geographers (e.g. Thomson, 1889; Slouschz, 1927; Montagne, 1930). In many of these accounts, the Jew is highly dependent on his Berber patron who protects him for his own interest. At times the patron himself might ransack his Jewish protégé’s property. Aside from this harsh presentation, there are scores of stories on how the Jews ingeniously contrived to safeguard their wealth and to ensure their personal well-being. Often the storyteller, during his narrative, asked God’s forgiveness for having duped the Muslims. Others are tales of mutual dependence, based on genuine mutual respect, which stress fair-play and personal friendship between the Jewish trader or craftsman and his Muslim client, partner, or patron.
Amran, an all-Jewish village which prior to immigration had a population of three hundred and fifty inhabitants, was divided into seven family groups. This familial division greatly overlapped the occupational division in the community. At the top of the economic and social ladder were the traders whose ancestor, according to family tradition, had been a merchant from Demnate, who, upon the invitation of a local sheikh, had settled in Amran. His sons and grandchildren, like him, were in trade ; they contracted farming partnerships with their neighbors for whom they put up capital, and they owned flocks of sheep grazed by Muslims with whom they shared the lambs. However, much of the trade consisted of nuts and the import of sugar, oil, as well as of other items. The senior members of the family of traders had in recent generations headed the community, and acted on its behalf in dealing with the local sheikhs (in Israel their neighbors have accused them of collaborating with the Muslims) [4].
The other families followed various crafts - cobbling, carpentry, and smithing. The poor and unskilled worked at odd jobs for the wealthier and skilled members of the community. Some of the craftsmen worked at home - particularly those who made embroidered shoes - others plied their craft in nearby or distant Berber settlements. All male members of the community came into direct contact with the Muslim population on an economic basis. There were almost no Jewish communal functions which exclusively provided a livelihood. Also the religious leaders were at times engaged in some kind of economic transaction or occupation. Trade and plying their crafts took the Jews over wide stretches of territories, crossing tribal borders, or, as they put it: ‘We traveled through different memshalot (governments)’. A former smith concluded his description of travels in search of work in Morocco with the sweeping statement, ‘For us craftsmen there were no borders.’
Their houses and the land the Jews usually rented from the Berbers. However, some of the merchants owned property [5]. As far as the people of Romema could remember, they had not paid regular taxes before the advent of the French administration. The wealthy, however, made costly gifts to their influential neighbors on the occasion of family celebrations or on holidays. They also bribed their sheikh to intercede on their behalf in disputes with their Muslim partners or debtors. Prior to French rule in the region, the local Berber sheikh was elected yearly by a council of the tribal grouping of Ait Mezalt [6].
Aside from their local sheikh and the landlords, Amran merchants and craftsmen were not necessarily permanently bound in business or by patronage to particular Berbers. Though they had sometimes developed special relationships with particular Berber families over a few generations, these ties could be cut off and new ones established without formality. However, their strongest ties were with those Berbers from whom they rented houses and land [7]. Their landlords would intervene in disputes with other Muslim families. The Jews, on the other hand, held aloof from any strife in which their patrons’ patronymic or tribal groupings were engaged. They would stay at home and wait for the tension to cool off. The trader or craftsman might have moved to another close or distant community upon the invitation of an employer or client to live on his estate. This mobility prompted by the search for livelihood may explain the changing size of Jewish communities in the Atlas Mountains, from less than ten inhabitants to three hundred or more (see Flamand’s census, 1959: 329-33).
The landlords and patrons were often intimately acquainted with their Jewish protégé’s personal and communal affairs. Thus, for example, the Romemites recall that in settling arguments or disputes between family groups in Amran, particularly between merchants and craftsmen, Berber neighbors were often witnesses or arbitrators. The itinerant craftsman might have remained with his Berber employer for days, or even weeks. His employer saw to his personal needs. Only on the Sabbath might the journeying craftsman have stayed at a nearby Jewish community or visited the synagogue. The Muslims also might come to visit, stay, and partake of food and drink at their Jewish partners’ or acquaintances’ homes [8]. Friendship was at times expressed in gestures of physical contact, as in the story of the craftsman whose employer kissed his brow, begging him to stay with him overnight.
During the generation preceding immigration to Israel, two Jews from Amran converted to Islam, both of whom had been itinerant craftsmen. The wife and children of one of them immigrated to Israel. The horrified brethren of the erstwhile Jews explained that the Berber employers of the latter had practiced ‘witchcraft’ on them, while serving them tea. According to the Romemites’ stories, however, it would seem that it was poverty and despair, at a particular hard time that drove the two to abandon their religion, family, and community. Altogether, conversion of individuals to Islam was a problem many communities in Morocco had to contend with.
The wealthier merchants on their major business trips to Demnate often became the target of robbers ; for protection they took with them on these journeys some robust members of the community. Prior to the establishment of French rule, local sheikhs ransacked on a number of occasions the property of the family of traders in Amran. According to their account, the last time the family was plundered the women were driven out of the house and the men tied up, but none was hurt. However, since the documents of all financial transactions had been well hidden, the family could renew its business, and it continued to thrive.
At other times, the merchant could count on his Muslim friends. When the last head of the community was caught by French custom officials with a load of unauthorized fabric, a commodity rationed at that time, he stopped on his way to the police station at one of his Muslim acquaintances’ home, and managed to leave with him part of his merchandise, loading sacks of straw instead.
The eldest son of the head of the community, in his frequent references to Amran, has vividly drawn the multi-faceted aspects of Jewish life in Morocco, as may be seen in the following succinct comment, phrased in a style often used in Romema in public debates and at ceremonies. This manner of speech interweaves metaphors with a somewhat archaic poetic language [9]. ‘The Jew even if very rich was stripped of honor in front of the Arab, and had to bow down to his will. But the Jew was always better dressed, better fed, and his house better furnished and stocked ! ’
On the relative safety of Jewish life in the Atlas Mountains, as perceived by the Romemites, we can learn from the following discussion. One evening, in Romema, while leaving the synagogue after the service, a settler spoke of the Negev Bedouin who were criss-crossing the borders of Jordan, Egypt and Israel, smuggling drugs into the country as well as all kinds of heavily taxable commodities. One of the listeners suggested that those who were caught should be ‘slaughtered’ - Upon which the son of the last head of the community, mentioned above, retorted with astonishment: ‘But why ? The Arabs didn’t slaughter us when we were living among them!’ Yet on other occasions, people spoke appreciatively of their changed circumstances in Israel: ‘It is better to live in Israel because it is safe. In Morocco, you could be rich, but the Arab could come any time and rob you of your wealth. Here you are not afraid of anyone; you can shout at, and even throw out, the Jewish Agency people, if you want to !’ [10]
The ambiguity in the position of Jews in Morocco, as well as the various modes of relating to their past existence among the Berbers, cropped up also in references by both former merchants and craftsmen to their manner of dress (though their tone and purpose of mentioning that point differed). The Jewish garb was usually white, but the merchants at times wore fancy and colorful clothes similar to the attire of Muslims. The craftsmen in recounting this added, not without a measure of satisfaction, that the proud merchants were the first to be molested not only by the highwaymen, but also by their Muslim patrons and neighbors.
The intermediary role of Atlas Mountain Jews
Today, when we try to assess what the Jewish situation had been in Muslim countries, we often compare it with the present situation in Israel or in Western countries. This is done also by the immigrants themselves, as evidenced by some of the earlier quotations, or in the following comment by a former shrewd merchant who was wont to speak of his methods of fooling his ignorant Muslim clients, and who, in Israel, had become a prosperous farmer:
I refrain from discussing the patterns of social and cultural life of Atlas Mountains Jews and possible cultural symbiotic elements with the surrounding Berber society [3]. Rather I concentrate on the basic material circumstances of their lives - residence, occupation, and safety. The present anthropological study will, I hope, further contribute to the descriptive and analytical spectrum of Jewish life in Morocco, through its assessment of the Jewish situation in some parts of the Atlas Mountains.
The circumstances of Jewish life in Amran
When I began to summarize my data on the relationships of the people of Amran with their neighbors (Shokeid, 1971/1985. 18-23), I realized that these could not be defined in clear-cut terms. The immigrants’ spontaneous stories and discussions as well as their answers to my direct questions were sometimes reminiscent of the pathetic descriptions of the position of Atlas Mountains Jews by nineteenth and early twentieth-century travelers and geographers (e.g. Thomson, 1889; Slouschz, 1927; Montagne, 1930). In many of these accounts, the Jew is highly dependent on his Berber patron who protects him for his own interest. At times the patron himself might ransack his Jewish protégé’s property. Aside from this harsh presentation, there are scores of stories on how the Jews ingeniously contrived to safeguard their wealth and to ensure their personal well-being. Often the storyteller, during his narrative, asked God’s forgiveness for having duped the Muslims. Others are tales of mutual dependence, based on genuine mutual respect, which stress fair-play and personal friendship between the Jewish trader or craftsman and his Muslim client, partner, or patron.
Amran, an all-Jewish village which prior to immigration had a population of three hundred and fifty inhabitants, was divided into seven family groups. This familial division greatly overlapped the occupational division in the community. At the top of the economic and social ladder were the traders whose ancestor, according to family tradition, had been a merchant from Demnate, who, upon the invitation of a local sheikh, had settled in Amran. His sons and grandchildren, like him, were in trade ; they contracted farming partnerships with their neighbors for whom they put up capital, and they owned flocks of sheep grazed by Muslims with whom they shared the lambs. However, much of the trade consisted of nuts and the import of sugar, oil, as well as of other items. The senior members of the family of traders had in recent generations headed the community, and acted on its behalf in dealing with the local sheikhs (in Israel their neighbors have accused them of collaborating with the Muslims) [4].
The other families followed various crafts - cobbling, carpentry, and smithing. The poor and unskilled worked at odd jobs for the wealthier and skilled members of the community. Some of the craftsmen worked at home - particularly those who made embroidered shoes - others plied their craft in nearby or distant Berber settlements. All male members of the community came into direct contact with the Muslim population on an economic basis. There were almost no Jewish communal functions which exclusively provided a livelihood. Also the religious leaders were at times engaged in some kind of economic transaction or occupation. Trade and plying their crafts took the Jews over wide stretches of territories, crossing tribal borders, or, as they put it: ‘We traveled through different memshalot (governments)’. A former smith concluded his description of travels in search of work in Morocco with the sweeping statement, ‘For us craftsmen there were no borders.’
Their houses and the land the Jews usually rented from the Berbers. However, some of the merchants owned property [5]. As far as the people of Romema could remember, they had not paid regular taxes before the advent of the French administration. The wealthy, however, made costly gifts to their influential neighbors on the occasion of family celebrations or on holidays. They also bribed their sheikh to intercede on their behalf in disputes with their Muslim partners or debtors. Prior to French rule in the region, the local Berber sheikh was elected yearly by a council of the tribal grouping of Ait Mezalt [6].
Aside from their local sheikh and the landlords, Amran merchants and craftsmen were not necessarily permanently bound in business or by patronage to particular Berbers. Though they had sometimes developed special relationships with particular Berber families over a few generations, these ties could be cut off and new ones established without formality. However, their strongest ties were with those Berbers from whom they rented houses and land [7]. Their landlords would intervene in disputes with other Muslim families. The Jews, on the other hand, held aloof from any strife in which their patrons’ patronymic or tribal groupings were engaged. They would stay at home and wait for the tension to cool off. The trader or craftsman might have moved to another close or distant community upon the invitation of an employer or client to live on his estate. This mobility prompted by the search for livelihood may explain the changing size of Jewish communities in the Atlas Mountains, from less than ten inhabitants to three hundred or more (see Flamand’s census, 1959: 329-33).
The landlords and patrons were often intimately acquainted with their Jewish protégé’s personal and communal affairs. Thus, for example, the Romemites recall that in settling arguments or disputes between family groups in Amran, particularly between merchants and craftsmen, Berber neighbors were often witnesses or arbitrators. The itinerant craftsman might have remained with his Berber employer for days, or even weeks. His employer saw to his personal needs. Only on the Sabbath might the journeying craftsman have stayed at a nearby Jewish community or visited the synagogue. The Muslims also might come to visit, stay, and partake of food and drink at their Jewish partners’ or acquaintances’ homes [8]. Friendship was at times expressed in gestures of physical contact, as in the story of the craftsman whose employer kissed his brow, begging him to stay with him overnight.
During the generation preceding immigration to Israel, two Jews from Amran converted to Islam, both of whom had been itinerant craftsmen. The wife and children of one of them immigrated to Israel. The horrified brethren of the erstwhile Jews explained that the Berber employers of the latter had practiced ‘witchcraft’ on them, while serving them tea. According to the Romemites’ stories, however, it would seem that it was poverty and despair, at a particular hard time that drove the two to abandon their religion, family, and community. Altogether, conversion of individuals to Islam was a problem many communities in Morocco had to contend with.
The wealthier merchants on their major business trips to Demnate often became the target of robbers ; for protection they took with them on these journeys some robust members of the community. Prior to the establishment of French rule, local sheikhs ransacked on a number of occasions the property of the family of traders in Amran. According to their account, the last time the family was plundered the women were driven out of the house and the men tied up, but none was hurt. However, since the documents of all financial transactions had been well hidden, the family could renew its business, and it continued to thrive.
At other times, the merchant could count on his Muslim friends. When the last head of the community was caught by French custom officials with a load of unauthorized fabric, a commodity rationed at that time, he stopped on his way to the police station at one of his Muslim acquaintances’ home, and managed to leave with him part of his merchandise, loading sacks of straw instead.
The eldest son of the head of the community, in his frequent references to Amran, has vividly drawn the multi-faceted aspects of Jewish life in Morocco, as may be seen in the following succinct comment, phrased in a style often used in Romema in public debates and at ceremonies. This manner of speech interweaves metaphors with a somewhat archaic poetic language [9]. ‘The Jew even if very rich was stripped of honor in front of the Arab, and had to bow down to his will. But the Jew was always better dressed, better fed, and his house better furnished and stocked ! ’
On the relative safety of Jewish life in the Atlas Mountains, as perceived by the Romemites, we can learn from the following discussion. One evening, in Romema, while leaving the synagogue after the service, a settler spoke of the Negev Bedouin who were criss-crossing the borders of Jordan, Egypt and Israel, smuggling drugs into the country as well as all kinds of heavily taxable commodities. One of the listeners suggested that those who were caught should be ‘slaughtered’ - Upon which the son of the last head of the community, mentioned above, retorted with astonishment: ‘But why ? The Arabs didn’t slaughter us when we were living among them!’ Yet on other occasions, people spoke appreciatively of their changed circumstances in Israel: ‘It is better to live in Israel because it is safe. In Morocco, you could be rich, but the Arab could come any time and rob you of your wealth. Here you are not afraid of anyone; you can shout at, and even throw out, the Jewish Agency people, if you want to !’ [10]
The ambiguity in the position of Jews in Morocco, as well as the various modes of relating to their past existence among the Berbers, cropped up also in references by both former merchants and craftsmen to their manner of dress (though their tone and purpose of mentioning that point differed). The Jewish garb was usually white, but the merchants at times wore fancy and colorful clothes similar to the attire of Muslims. The craftsmen in recounting this added, not without a measure of satisfaction, that the proud merchants were the first to be molested not only by the highwaymen, but also by their Muslim patrons and neighbors.
The intermediary role of Atlas Mountain Jews
Today, when we try to assess what the Jewish situation had been in Muslim countries, we often compare it with the present situation in Israel or in Western countries. This is done also by the immigrants themselves, as evidenced by some of the earlier quotations, or in the following comment by a former shrewd merchant who was wont to speak of his methods of fooling his ignorant Muslim clients, and who, in Israel, had become a prosperous farmer:
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"When we came to Israel we thought we would be given a small hut to live in and only bread to eat. I never dreamt we would have electricity and that I would own a refrigerator, a washing machine, and a tractor! There are Jews who return to the country of origin. Not me! I shall not go back to Morocco, even if I get thousands in cash! I shall not return to be cursed again by Arabs!"
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This former merchant has thus filtered his perspective of life in Morocco, inter alia, through his comprehension of personal achievements in Israel. These greatly surpassed his expectations, which at the time of immigration had been motivated by Messianic beliefs (Shokeid, 1971/1985: 32-3).
This brings us back to our introductory note on the interpretative factor embedded in the informants’ apprehension of their past and present situation. But, as demonstrated earlier, the Romemites’ recollections were not geared into a definitive formula of positive or negative interpretations of their social position and of their relationships with their neighbors in Morocco. Consistency in interpretation is, it seems, more typical of outsiders, including scholars, or to ideologically motivated ‘natives.’ As mentioned, in the Romemites’ view of life in Morocco the Berbers at times played a prominent role in relationships of Jews among themselves (Shokeid, 1971: 26).
No doubt the Jews of Amran did not leave a ‘paradise’ behind them, a notion which may be inferred from those who refer to symbiotic relationships between Jews and Berbers. They were a low-class minority; an inferior status, which, however, did not deprive them in all spheres of life. The Berbers were highly dependent on their many and varied services, which were not confined only to those occupations prohibited to Muslims. The Jews were also not the lowest status group in the Atlas Mountains; lower, for example, were the blacks, the descendants of former slaves, who traditionally were servants or followed such crafts as pottery. Within this framework of economic relationships and interdependence, the prosperous Jew could own land and prove his economic achievements and the special social relationships he had established with influential Berbers through fancy ‘non-Jewish’ dress.
To obtain a broader perspective of Jewish life in the Islamic world we may compare the Atlas Mountains situation with the position of Jews as observed in Iran in the 1960s [11]. Iranian Jews were confined, well into the twentieth century, to the most despised occupations and forced to show humiliating signs of identity, and they were considered of low moral standing. Bodily contact with a Jew was still in some places polluting to his Muslim neighbor. A Jew’s property life and honor were never secure. He learned to hide his material possessions. to look destitute and humble. Loeb (this volume, chapter 18) argues that the Iranian Jews’ occupations as peddler, moneylender, entertainer, vendor of liquor and prostitution, which lead to interaction with diverse social groups, might have placed him in a position of communicator or disseminator of ideas. As an outcast however - humiliated and polluting - he, in fact, served to insulate the various segments of the population from one another, and thus performed an important service for the Persian elite
The potential role of the Jew as mediator between various groups in society has been suggested as explaining the position of Jews in two polar extremes of Muslim environments: Rosen (1972) who analyzed the intermediary role of the Jew between Arabs and Berbers, and Loeb (this volume, chapter 18) who interpreted the Jew’s communicatory potentiality as transformed into an insulating function. Though the approach of the intermediary role of the Jew cannot alone explain the complex Jewish situation, as manifest in Morocco or in Iran, it is a key variable in elucidating the Jewish situation in many places throughout the history of the Diaspora. In our case, the Jew cast in an intermediary role clarifies some aspects of Jewish existence in the Atlas Mountains.
In some parts of Morocco the Jew might have played an intermediary role between the two distinct ethnic categories of non-Jewish society, the Arabs and the Berbers. In the Atlas Mountains, the role of Jews was, inter alia, intermediary between different Berber tribal groupings - a hypothesis which calls for further research. The Atlas Mountains Jews were living in what is known as bled es-siba, or ‘land of dissidence’ and ‘disorder.’ The central administration of the Sultan was not effective in these parts of Morocco and even the advent of French rule had little influence.
Only at a late stage of French occupation - since the second quarter of this century were changes imposed. The surrounding Berber society was segmentary, organized agnatically, and in continuous inter- or intra-tribal conflict (see Gellner, 1972; Hart, 1972, 1976; Burke, 1976). Basic to the political tribal system were the Igurramen (marabouts), members of holy lineages, who did not belong to the tribal groupings, mediated in disputes, and applied tribal customs (such as the election of chiefs by rotation). They were endowed with baraka (divine grace), pacific, and their person was safe (Gellner, 1969, 1972).
The mosaic of Berber society, aside from these holy outsiders, comprised another network of communities of pacific and secure outsiders - the Jews - who rendered vital economic services, yet were powerless due to their lower status, which was manifest in their humble behavior. Therefore services rendered by Jews or trading with them was not socially committing, which would not have been the case had the interaction been with a Berber from another patronymic group, and that might have been degrading for one party. Lack of commitment was especially significant in partnerships with Jews, who put up the capital in farming and herding enterprises ; but also in day-to-day trading with the Jewish merchant who extended credit to his clients. This vital interaction with the Berbers placed the Jewish merchants and traders in Ait Bou Oulli, in an advantageous position evidenced, inter alia, by their superior station in the Jewish community.
Hart’s study of Jews shortly before immigration to Israel, and his recording of comments made by Berbers after the mass departure of Jews, succinctly encapsulate some features of Jewish existence observed by the other side:
This brings us back to our introductory note on the interpretative factor embedded in the informants’ apprehension of their past and present situation. But, as demonstrated earlier, the Romemites’ recollections were not geared into a definitive formula of positive or negative interpretations of their social position and of their relationships with their neighbors in Morocco. Consistency in interpretation is, it seems, more typical of outsiders, including scholars, or to ideologically motivated ‘natives.’ As mentioned, in the Romemites’ view of life in Morocco the Berbers at times played a prominent role in relationships of Jews among themselves (Shokeid, 1971: 26).
No doubt the Jews of Amran did not leave a ‘paradise’ behind them, a notion which may be inferred from those who refer to symbiotic relationships between Jews and Berbers. They were a low-class minority; an inferior status, which, however, did not deprive them in all spheres of life. The Berbers were highly dependent on their many and varied services, which were not confined only to those occupations prohibited to Muslims. The Jews were also not the lowest status group in the Atlas Mountains; lower, for example, were the blacks, the descendants of former slaves, who traditionally were servants or followed such crafts as pottery. Within this framework of economic relationships and interdependence, the prosperous Jew could own land and prove his economic achievements and the special social relationships he had established with influential Berbers through fancy ‘non-Jewish’ dress.
To obtain a broader perspective of Jewish life in the Islamic world we may compare the Atlas Mountains situation with the position of Jews as observed in Iran in the 1960s [11]. Iranian Jews were confined, well into the twentieth century, to the most despised occupations and forced to show humiliating signs of identity, and they were considered of low moral standing. Bodily contact with a Jew was still in some places polluting to his Muslim neighbor. A Jew’s property life and honor were never secure. He learned to hide his material possessions. to look destitute and humble. Loeb (this volume, chapter 18) argues that the Iranian Jews’ occupations as peddler, moneylender, entertainer, vendor of liquor and prostitution, which lead to interaction with diverse social groups, might have placed him in a position of communicator or disseminator of ideas. As an outcast however - humiliated and polluting - he, in fact, served to insulate the various segments of the population from one another, and thus performed an important service for the Persian elite
The potential role of the Jew as mediator between various groups in society has been suggested as explaining the position of Jews in two polar extremes of Muslim environments: Rosen (1972) who analyzed the intermediary role of the Jew between Arabs and Berbers, and Loeb (this volume, chapter 18) who interpreted the Jew’s communicatory potentiality as transformed into an insulating function. Though the approach of the intermediary role of the Jew cannot alone explain the complex Jewish situation, as manifest in Morocco or in Iran, it is a key variable in elucidating the Jewish situation in many places throughout the history of the Diaspora. In our case, the Jew cast in an intermediary role clarifies some aspects of Jewish existence in the Atlas Mountains.
In some parts of Morocco the Jew might have played an intermediary role between the two distinct ethnic categories of non-Jewish society, the Arabs and the Berbers. In the Atlas Mountains, the role of Jews was, inter alia, intermediary between different Berber tribal groupings - a hypothesis which calls for further research. The Atlas Mountains Jews were living in what is known as bled es-siba, or ‘land of dissidence’ and ‘disorder.’ The central administration of the Sultan was not effective in these parts of Morocco and even the advent of French rule had little influence.
Only at a late stage of French occupation - since the second quarter of this century were changes imposed. The surrounding Berber society was segmentary, organized agnatically, and in continuous inter- or intra-tribal conflict (see Gellner, 1972; Hart, 1972, 1976; Burke, 1976). Basic to the political tribal system were the Igurramen (marabouts), members of holy lineages, who did not belong to the tribal groupings, mediated in disputes, and applied tribal customs (such as the election of chiefs by rotation). They were endowed with baraka (divine grace), pacific, and their person was safe (Gellner, 1969, 1972).
The mosaic of Berber society, aside from these holy outsiders, comprised another network of communities of pacific and secure outsiders - the Jews - who rendered vital economic services, yet were powerless due to their lower status, which was manifest in their humble behavior. Therefore services rendered by Jews or trading with them was not socially committing, which would not have been the case had the interaction been with a Berber from another patronymic group, and that might have been degrading for one party. Lack of commitment was especially significant in partnerships with Jews, who put up the capital in farming and herding enterprises ; but also in day-to-day trading with the Jewish merchant who extended credit to his clients. This vital interaction with the Berbers placed the Jewish merchants and traders in Ait Bou Oulli, in an advantageous position evidenced, inter alia, by their superior station in the Jewish community.
Hart’s study of Jews shortly before immigration to Israel, and his recording of comments made by Berbers after the mass departure of Jews, succinctly encapsulate some features of Jewish existence observed by the other side:
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The keynote of Jewish behavior was that of safety in humility; conversely, for a powerful man to have ‘his own’ Jew was considered a sign of prestige. Because the Jews stood entirely outside the political system, and because their occupational services were much in demand, many informants said that to kill or even to molest a Jew was an infinitely worse offense than to kill a fellow tribesman. (Hart, 1976: 280)
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Although these two sets of records, my own from Israel and Hart’s from Morocco, do not originate with the same group of Jews and their Berber neighbors, they reflect complementary interpretations of some elements of Jewish existence in Morocco. As it appears from the Romemites’ experience, the Jewish craftsman, peddler and merchant could live in his community or travel with little risk involved, and he was welcomed, though he did not enjoy an honored position, in nearby or remote Berber settlements. [12]
The course of peaceful coexistence might have been intermittently interrupted, but the Jew could normally rely on the protection of his patron, employer, or client, and draw some sense of security from the local cultural code which specified rules to safeguard the weak and helpless, such as women and Jews. This position of the Jew, comprising both the inferior status and circumstantial advantages, opened the doors of Berber homes and tribal and sub-tribal territorial borders to the itinerant Jew. ‘For us, the craftsmen, there were no borders’, remarked to me one of Amran’s former smiths, and thus elucidated the situation he experienced in Morocco.
Concluding note
We started our discussion by presenting a polarity of opinions about the position of Moroccan Jewry. Our case does not fully support either of these viewpoints. It seems as if both Rosen and Stillman described a ‘true’ but partial reality of the Jewish situation. That perception of reality is not modified by the contradictions of daily existence which some scholars might view as ‘non-data,’ as, for example, the intervals of economic and social interaction and cooperation between a subordinate ethnic minority and a dominant majority.
Accordingly, Rosen and Stillman have drawn clear-cut conclusions ; the harmonious perspective versus the conflict perspective in Jewish-Muslim relationships. I have suggested some additional situational and structural factors which affected the position of Jews and their relationships with their neighbors. I emphasized the interpretative element embedded in the Romemites’ perception of their experience in Morocco. Their perception and interpretations yield a complex image of Jewish-Muslim interaction evidenced by their paradoxical accounts of harmony and conflict. These presentations are genuine expressions of the existential experience of Atlas Mountains Jews, which cannot be dismissed because of apparent inconsistency.
Thus, while most scholars have tried to formulate consistent paradigms, representative of at least, some geographical areas, or certain historical periods, such consistent paradigms may be nonexistent. Also certain rabbinical texts, or other forms of extant records, sometimes arouse disagreement when used as sole basis for interpretation. The verbal communications which I collected about life in Morocco offer a kind of data which is rarely recorded. That type of material, if it survives at all, is with the passage of time absorbed into such forms of discourse as folklore and folk tales.
The course of peaceful coexistence might have been intermittently interrupted, but the Jew could normally rely on the protection of his patron, employer, or client, and draw some sense of security from the local cultural code which specified rules to safeguard the weak and helpless, such as women and Jews. This position of the Jew, comprising both the inferior status and circumstantial advantages, opened the doors of Berber homes and tribal and sub-tribal territorial borders to the itinerant Jew. ‘For us, the craftsmen, there were no borders’, remarked to me one of Amran’s former smiths, and thus elucidated the situation he experienced in Morocco.
Concluding note
We started our discussion by presenting a polarity of opinions about the position of Moroccan Jewry. Our case does not fully support either of these viewpoints. It seems as if both Rosen and Stillman described a ‘true’ but partial reality of the Jewish situation. That perception of reality is not modified by the contradictions of daily existence which some scholars might view as ‘non-data,’ as, for example, the intervals of economic and social interaction and cooperation between a subordinate ethnic minority and a dominant majority.
Accordingly, Rosen and Stillman have drawn clear-cut conclusions ; the harmonious perspective versus the conflict perspective in Jewish-Muslim relationships. I have suggested some additional situational and structural factors which affected the position of Jews and their relationships with their neighbors. I emphasized the interpretative element embedded in the Romemites’ perception of their experience in Morocco. Their perception and interpretations yield a complex image of Jewish-Muslim interaction evidenced by their paradoxical accounts of harmony and conflict. These presentations are genuine expressions of the existential experience of Atlas Mountains Jews, which cannot be dismissed because of apparent inconsistency.
Thus, while most scholars have tried to formulate consistent paradigms, representative of at least, some geographical areas, or certain historical periods, such consistent paradigms may be nonexistent. Also certain rabbinical texts, or other forms of extant records, sometimes arouse disagreement when used as sole basis for interpretation. The verbal communications which I collected about life in Morocco offer a kind of data which is rarely recorded. That type of material, if it survives at all, is with the passage of time absorbed into such forms of discourse as folklore and folk tales.
Source
Abbreviation of a paper in ‘Actes du Colloque International de l’Institut d’Histoire des Pays d’Outre-Mer,’ Abbaye de Senanque, Octobre 1978, 62-91. © Copyright 1980 by Editions du Centre National de La Recherche Scientifique. Reprinted by permission of the Centre National de La Recherche Scientifique (CNRS).
Notes
The study was supported by the Bernstein Israeli Research Trust, through the Department of Social Anthropology of Manchester University, directed by the late Professor Max Gluckman. and by a grant from the Faculty of Social Sciences at Tel-Aviv University. I am grateful to S. Deshen for his comments and to A. Sommer who helped with the editing.
References
Abbreviation of a paper in ‘Actes du Colloque International de l’Institut d’Histoire des Pays d’Outre-Mer,’ Abbaye de Senanque, Octobre 1978, 62-91. © Copyright 1980 by Editions du Centre National de La Recherche Scientifique. Reprinted by permission of the Centre National de La Recherche Scientifique (CNRS).
Notes
The study was supported by the Bernstein Israeli Research Trust, through the Department of Social Anthropology of Manchester University, directed by the late Professor Max Gluckman. and by a grant from the Faculty of Social Sciences at Tel-Aviv University. I am grateful to S. Deshen for his comments and to A. Sommer who helped with the editing.
- Pseudonyms are given to the village in Israel and to the community in Morocco in order to disguise the identity of the people studied, a standard procedure in anthropological monographs.
- To avoid identification of the people studied, I used in previous publications the name Etgor instead of Ait Bou Oulli. The district of Ait Bou Oulli comprised several Jewish communities.
- See my works on kinship, family and religion among Jews in the Atlas Mountains, Shokeid, 1971/1985; Deshen and Shokeid, 1974.
- Community life in Romema is very much influenced by the conflict and competition between the former traders and the rest of the community (see particularly Shokeid, 1971/1985: 23-8.101-64; Deshen and Shokeid, 1974: 64-94; Shokeid, 1976).
- Flamand (1959: 86) also reports that a few families owned land at Ait Bou Oulli.
- See Gellner, 1972 and Hart, 1972 who describe this system of annual election of tribal chiefs.
- See also Hart’s evidence on the particular relationships between the Berber landlord and his Jewish tenant (1976: 280).
- See also Flamand who reports on Berbers drinking in the homes of Jews (1959: 99).
- See my reference to that manner of speech in Romema (1971: 134-5).
- In rural settlements, Jewish Agency representatives were responsible in many matters related to farming, housing, and financial credit.
- This comparison is obviously limited by the particular influence of Iranian Shi’ism on the position of Jews (Loeb, ch. 18).
- The Jews, as other members of pacific groups (of lower or higher status), were exempt from payment of dhazttat, the protection fee a traveler paid to go from his own tribe into the territory of another (see Hart, 1976: 303-4).
References
- Burke, E. (1976) Prelude to Protectorate in Morocco (Chicago: University of Chicago Press).
- Chouraqui, A.C. (1968) Between East and West (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society).
- Deshen, S. and Shokeid, M. (1974) The Predicament of Homecoming: Cultural and Social Life of North African Immigrants in Israel (Ithaca. NY: Cornell University Press).
- Flamand, P. (1959) Diaspora en Terre d’Islam: Les Communautés Israélites du Sud Marocain (Casablanca: Presses des Imprimeries Réunies).
- Geertz, C. (1973) The Interpretation of Cultures (New York: Basic Books).
- Gellner, E. (1969) Saints of the Atlas (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson).
- Gellner, E. (1972) ‘Political and Religious Organization of the Berbers of the Central High Atlas,’ in E. Gellner and C. Micaud (eds), Arabs and Berbers (Lexington: Heath) 59-66.
- Hart, D.M. (1972) ‘The Tribe in Modern Morocco,’ in E. Gellner and C. Micaud (eds), Arabs and Berbers (Lexington: Heath) 25-58.
- Hart, D.M. (1976) The Aith Waryushun of the Moroccan Rif: An Ethnography and History (Texas: University of Arizona Press).
- Loeb, L.D. (1976/reprinted below) ‘Dhimmi Status and Jewish Roles in Iranian Society,’ Ethnic Groups 1: 89-105.
- Montagne, R. (1930) Les Berbères et le makhzen dans le sud du Maroc: Essai sur la transformation politique des Berbères sédentaires (Paris: Felix Alcan).
- Shokeid, M. (1971/1985) The Dual Heritage: Immigrants from the Atlas Mountains in an Israeli Village. Manchester: Manchester University Press (augmented edition, Transaction Books).
- Shokeid, M. (1976) ‘Conviviality Versus Strife: Peacemaking at Parties Among Atlas Mountain Immigrants in Israel,’ Political Anthropology 1: 101-21.
- Slouschz, N. (1927) Travels in North Africa (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society).
- Thomson, J. (1889) Travels in the Atlas and Southern Morocco (London: George Philip).
- Willner, D. (1969) Nation Building and Community in Israel (Princeton: Princeton University Press).
