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

ut for the most part this is a heretofore forgotten aspect of the history of the Islamic world. 54
Certainly for the case of Morocco, there has yet to be any systematic study of whether or how
Muslims used Jewish courts. 55 Muslims’ choice to ignore the prevailing jurisdictional
boundaries challenges accounts of law in the Islamic world that reduce law to its Islamic
iteration and ignore the legal pluralism which was relevant to all members of society, including
Muslims.
Muslims mostly appeared in Jewish courts in order to notarize the sale or lease of real
estate to or from Jews. 56 Muslims’ choice to sometimes draw up documents attesting to their
real estate transactions with sofrim rather than ‘udūl in some ways mirrors Jews’ decisions to
register their intra-Jewish property transfers with ‘udūl rather than sofrim. As discussed above, it
is possible that the particular nature of real estate made Moroccans, both Jewish and Muslim,
want to have all their bases covered by obtaining proof of ownership in both legal systems. One
Muslim in particular, named Abū Bakr al-Ghanjāwī, went to the beit din on a number of
occasions to register his acquisitions of real estate in the millāḥ of Fez. 57 Al-Ghanjāwī was
almost certainly interested in acquiring these properties as investments; it is nearly unthinkable
that a Muslim like him would have lived in the millāḥ. 58 Rather, he probably rented out the
properties to Jews, thus earning monthly returns on his investment. On January 16, 1889, al-
54
Marcus, The Middle East on the Eve of Modernity, 109. Similarly, I have not come across detailed discussions of
Christians using Jewish courts in Europe, though there is evidence that Christians went to batei din both for matters
involving Jews and for intra-Christian cases: see, e.g., Assaf, Batei ha-din ve-sidreihem, 16-17.
55
J. Goulven mentions briefly that some Muslims preferred to adjudicate their disputes with Jews in batei din, but
does not examine this phenomenon in detail: J. Goulven, Traité d’économie et de législation marocaines (Paris:
Librairie des sciences économiques et sociales, 1921), 15, fn 1.
56
Of the nineteen documents concerning Muslims’ appearance in Jewish courts which I found, fourteen of these
concerned the buying or leasing of real estate.
57
Al-Ghanjāwī was a British protégé, worked for the British Legation in Tangier, and began life as a camel driver
(which indicates his humble origins). On al-Ghanjāwī, see Ben-Srhir, Britain and Morocco, 171.
58
After 1912, when the French decreed that Jews could own property and live outside of the millāḥs, there were
instances in which Muslims moved into formerly Jewish quarters; however, as far as I know this was unheard of in
the pre-colonial period.
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