IN THE COURTS OF THE NATIONS - DataSpace - Princeton ...

synagogue and swore an “oath of payment” (yamīn al-qaḍā’). 189 At times Muslims similarly
acquiesced in Jews’ demands that they take an oath. 190 Overall, there was little difference in
how Jews and Muslims used the oath as a legal tool.
The litigious documents in the Assarraf collection show that Jews used the sharī‘a court
not only as a notary public, but also as a tribunal. They pursued recalcitrant debtors, sued
guarantors for the sums they had guaranteed, and were, in turn, sued for sums they owed others.
As non-Muslims in an Islamic system of justice, Jews were in some ways disadvantaged; in
Morocco, their religious identity particularly affected their ability to testify as part of a lafīf.
However, most aspects their experience in a sharī‘a court were not fundamentally different from
that of Muslims. Jews submitted documents signed by ‘udūl as evidence, took oaths, and even
solicited muftīs for fatāwā in support of their pleas in the same ways as did Muslims.
* * *
Sharī‘a courts in nineteenth-century Morocco were institutions which applied Islamic law
and were staffed by Muslims, but they were far from exclusively Muslim. On the contrary, Jews
were habitual patrons of sharī‘a courts, availing themselves of the services of qāḍīs and ‘udūl on
a regular basis. As businessmen, Jews fostered countless commercial relations with Muslims. In
the case of the Assarraf family, as for many other Jewish merchants, this mostly meant selling
goods on credit. It was in Jews’ interest to ensure that each of these relationships was attested by
legally binding documentation—that is, notarized by ‘udūl. Producing this kind of
documentation meant that Jews could rely on sharī‘a courts to enforce the contracts they signed,
should they need to sue pursue litigation.
189
TC, File #1, 6 Jumādā II 1299 (on the back of a bill of debt dated 1 Rabī‘ II 1295). For an instance in which a
Jew agreed to take an oath, see File #1, 6 Shawwāl 1283.
190
See, e.g., File #1, 29 Dhū al-Qa‘da 1291; File #9, 4 Ṣafar 1294 (in which Shalom demanded that a Muslim swear
that Shalom had given him a mule: the Muslim swore that this was true, and that the mule had subsequently died).
116