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custom and the sultan’s command. 79 The Jews, however, were engaging in a number of illicit
activities at the instigation of their shaykh and the qāḍī of Radānā, who were in league with each
other. In particular, the Jews’ shaykh had convinced them not to pay the jizya and was selling
them forged patents of foreign protection. 80
Although the archives do not always preserve the outcome of Jews’ collective petitions to
the Makhzan, the incidents discussed above show that the Moroccan state felt responsible for the
well-being of its Jewish subjects. Even in those instances when local officials protested their
innocence in the face of Jews’ allegations of abuse, the very fact that they bothered to write
defensive letters to the sultan indicates that the Makhzan as a whole took those accusations
seriously.
Crimes Posing a Communal Threat
Some of the collective appeals to the Makhzan concerned injustices committed against
individual Jews. Jews generally wrote such appeals when a crime committed against one of
theiri coreligionists posed a sufficient threat to the entire Jewish community of a given place. In
these instances, representatives of the Jewish community concerned petitioned the Makhzan
collectively on behalf of their unfortunate coreligionist. 81 While these cases are in many ways
79
“And that he did not govern over them except according to what the sultan ordered in his royal decree…and he
did not break with custom [in his treatment of them].” (Wa-annahu lam yuwalla illā mā adhinahu mawlānā bitawliyatihi
‘alayhim ḥasabamā bi-’l-ẓahīr al-sharīf…wa-lam yakhriq ‘alayhim ‘ādatan.)
80
Additional cases include: DAR, Yahūd, 36147, al-Jīlānī b. Ya‘qūb to Muḥammad Bargāsh, 9 Rabī‘ II 1298 (in
this letter, al-Jīlānī responded to accusations that he had mistreated the Jews in his city; he countered that the Jews
were lying, and that the true motive behind their complaint was his arrest of a Jew who had poisoned a shaykh—
similarly implying that his actions were completely justified); BH, K 157, p. 121, 24 Rabī‘ II 1307 (in which the
Jews of Safi complained about mistreatment at the hands of their governor, ‘Abd al-Khāliq b. Hīma; Ibn Hīma
responds that the Jews’ true motive was their displeasure at his arrest—at the sultan’s command—of Yehudah b.
Ḥaim and his son, following Ibn Hīma’s cousin’s complaint against them).
81
It is not always clear exactly who the petitioners representing the community were; often letters were simply
signed by the Jews of a particular town, such as “the Jews of Safi.” It is possible that communal officials, such as
the ma‘amad (council of elders) of a particular city, officially represented the local Jews. Another possibility is that
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