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“there was no basis to this claim” (lā aṣla lihādhihi al-da‘wā). 24 Two opposing camps had developed among Demnat’s Jews, one that felt they were being oppressed by their governor and appealed to the Makhzan and foreigners to gain redress, and another that disapproved of their coreligionists’ actions and appealed to the sultan to stop them. 25 The acrimonious relationship among Demnati Jews and their governor was not resolved in 1884 and Jews continued to appeal to the Makhzan and foreigners for redress. 26 In 1887, Mawlāy Ḥasan made a personal visit to Demnat and ordered the building of a new millāḥ at the request of the city’s Muslim and Jewish notables. 27 This episode is also of interest in that it indicates that walled Jewish quarters were at times perceived by Jews as advantageous to their security—especially in light of an earlier petition in which Demnati Jews complained to the sultan that the lack of walls separating them from Muslims made them fear for their safety. 28 Needless to say, the story of Demnat’s Jews and their relationship with al-Jilālī was far more complex than one in which foreign intervention protected them from the abuses of their governor. Demnati Jews maximized their chances of gaining redress by appealing to both foreigners and the Makhzan. 24 Ibid. 25 See also a legal document from 3 Ṣafar 1302/ 22 November 1884 (DAR, Yahūd, 15599), in which a group of Jews testified concerning their coreligionists who, seeing that Jews in other towns were not punished for attacking Muslims, had thrown stones at Muslims and attacked them. The Jews testifying in this document clearly disapproved of their coreligionists’ actions. 26 For petitions to the Makhzan, see BH, K 157, p. 35, 22 Ramaḍān 1306 and p. 44, 12 Shawwāl 1306. For petitions to the AIU, see AIU, Maroc III C10 E2, Elihu Moshe Panisel to AIU, Av 5645 (received 28 August 1895). 27 See the legal document from 17 Sha‘bān 1304/ 11 May 1887 with lists of Muslim and Jewish notables noted on the side of the document. Although the document was framed in terms of the annoyances caused to Muslims by the mingling of Jews and Muslims, the Jews present declared that they accepted the place assigned for the new millāḥ and pledge to move their cemetery and to leave their present houses once the new millāḥ was constructed (in Flamand, Un mellah en pays berbère, 161-4). See also the ẓahīr from the same date (in ibid., 159-60) in which the sultan ordered the construction of the new millāḥ. Of course, this did not prevent at least some of the Jews from refusing to move to the new millāḥ: see DAR, Yahūd, 27937, al-Ṭayyib (al-Yamanī?) to Mawlāy Ḥasan, 8 Rabī‘ I 1308. On the sultan’s visit to Demnat, see also Berque, L’intérieur du Maghreb, 477. 28 DAR, Demnat, Mawlāy Ḥasan to al-Jilālī al-Dimnātī, 30 Rabī‘ I 1296. See also Flamand, Un mellah en pays berbère, 20. Flamand claimed that the new millāḥ was completed in 1894, though he does not cite a source for this date. 340
The events in Demnat were not the only ones which prompted Jews to appeal to both foreigners and the Makhzan. When the Jews of Casablanca sent a letter to the Jews of Tangier asking them to transmit their complaint about the abuses of their governor to the Makhzan in 1877 (discussed in Chapter Six), the Casablancan Jews had already made two other attempts to resolve the matter. 29 They first tried to convince their qā’id to release their unjustly-imprisoned coreligionists. When this failed, they requested assistance from the British consul in Casablanca. The British consul spoke to the qā’id on their behalf, but with no luck. It was only after trying and failing with local Makhzan officials and a foreign consul that the Jews of Casablanca brought the matter to the sultan’s attention. In the summer of 1878, when the trash was piling up in the streets of the millāḥ of Fez and the putrid smell of cow dung was literally sickening its residents, the Jews opted for two strategies to improve the situation. 30 On the one hand, they complained to some foreign consular officials, hoping that they would be able to exert influence on the Makhzan. 31 The consular officials’ protégés and “friends” (aṣḥāb) wrote a letter to Muḥammad Bargāsh, asking him to write to their local qā’id, Sa‘īd b. al-Farajī, with instructions to help the Jewish shaykhs and rabbis clean up the millāḥ. The Jewish elders (ḥazānūn) wrote a separate letter directly to al- Farajī with the same complaint. 32 Though it is not clear which letter came first, it is possible that the Jews wrote to al-Farajī and the foreign consuls simultaneously in order to maximize their chances of getting a response. Ultimately it seems that the appeal to Bargāsh proved effective, since he ordered al-Farajī to gather the Jewish leaders and aid them in sanitizing the millāḥ. 29 DAR, Yahūd, 15587, Jews of Casablanca to Jews of Tangier, 26 Rabī‘a I 1294. 30 DAR, Fez, 6078, Muḥammad Bargāsh to Sa‘īd b. Farajī, 11 Sha‘bān 1295. 31 The letter mentioning this incident does not specify to which consular officials the Jews appealed, nor where they were (since at the time there were no foreign consulates in Fez). 32 Ibid.: Bargāsh asked al-Farajī to send this letter to him. 341
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IN THE COURTS OF THE NATIONS: JEWS,
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Abstract This dissertation examines
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Table of Contents Abstract………
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throughout the process was vital to
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and Arielle Rubenstein, Stephanie S
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Introduction This dissertation exam
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on the internal history of the Jewi
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cases they made up close to half of
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study of law in the Islamic world w
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of these institutions remain opaque
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and, for some individuals, appealin
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actors with agency and to understan
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many of those who espouse the neo-l
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In recent years, the neo-lachrymose
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alternative framework to that of au
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including courts—which were of pr
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Recently scholars working on the me
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We are left with two models of Jewi
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Legal pluralism is an approach to u
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orders. I also turn the focus from
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Nonetheless, the tendency of forum
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Legal pluralism does not explain wh
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Jewish communities were no less var
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is perhaps best attested by the fac
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To help remind readers that the thr
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abusive Makhzan officials, infringe
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Chapter One: Between Batei Din and
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went to batei din and sharī‘a co
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school relevant for our purposes is
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Jewish and Islamic legal systems re
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ehind, a large number were undoubte
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atei din generally, it does reflect
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Jews used batei din not only as not
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Jerusalem. 33 The collection consis
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(azraqu al-‘aynayn)—a trait for
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undoubtedly made much of their mone
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preventing members of the community
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‘udūl. 76 These ‘udūl, whose
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Eliyahu b. Ya'aqov Zohra bat Ya‘a
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and Muḥammad would return the mon
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Table 2.1 Types of Entries 2% 2% 2%
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allegation or deposition in a case
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court approximately once a week, ei
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The introduction of the “protecti
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ule; the ‘udūl almost always too
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documents would stand up as evidenc
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Empire. 49 A document in the Assarr
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legal procedure was relatively mino
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een optional as not all bills of de
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Qa‘da 1309 (June 12, 1892), two
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mostly meant extending credit on go
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Other release documents specify tha
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al-faqīh Aḥmad al-Filālī al-Ma
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Lease contracts, on the other hand,
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which was operated by Muslims durin
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Shalom’s knowledge of Islamic law
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elow). Although the majority of law
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weeks after the plaintiff filed the
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gathered twelve men who testified t
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whether the qāḍī accepted al-
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in the Assarraf collection indicate
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(ittifāqīyan) and were testifying
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In another instance of oath avoidan
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Sharī‘a courts provided a crucia
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agreement notarized according to Is
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ability and desire to move among di
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‘udūl. 14 Most real estate trans
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equire or benefit from adjudication
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Simultaneous Use of Jewish and Isla
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evidence from the nineteenth centur
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to sue other Jews in sharī‘a cou
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But what about intra-Jewish lawsuit
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ut for the most part this is a here
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the sum of three duoros per month.
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only in Jewish law. This happened i
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in the millāḥ of Marrakesh on Ap
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aware of Jewish law and sometimes t
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of a rabbi to determine the proper
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‘Aṭṭār, in order to find out
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Muslims’ jurisdictional boundary
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that they had successfully done so.
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the Moroccan legal system more broa
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translated as the territories under
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elatively scant work on the legal h
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law, even if they did not consisten
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abrupt end after his death, as the
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put it, “in all medieval Muslim s
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about its image in the eyes of fore
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an injustice or an act of oppressio
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In designing its new army, the Makh
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The Ministry itself, although in co
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Minister of Complaints, a man about
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It is not entirely clear whether th
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initial letters. 102 The convention
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whether the sultan simply failed to
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Chapter Five: Appeals to the Minist
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Jews and the Ministry of Complaints
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The nature of these sources prevent
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Causes for Complaint Most of the ap
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products (such as barley). 23 This,
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appears numerous times). 29 While t
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matter what their religious backgro
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when amounts are specified they ten
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cases which were ultimately settled
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Jews who had been robbed. 62 The su
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from July 28, 1892, a group of Jews
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nature of sharī‘a courts. 83 In
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legal proof of his claim. 91 It is
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the Jewish victims were compensated
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central government could only do so
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and Muslim was responsible for arra
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sometimes the Makhzan officials’
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A more formidable obstacle to settl
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The Jewish creditor, however, reque
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The practice of exaggerating the va
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official accused a Jew of falsifyin
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esolve disputes with their Jewish d
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property. 178 In this case, the Mak
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Chapter Six: Collective Appeals to
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frequency of Jews’ petitions acro
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The concentration of petitions duri
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“right”—as in, the rights to
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merchants serve as judges on a rota
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Makhzan officials at times evoked t
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The evidence of Jews’ appeals to
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governor). 46 The next winter the J
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along with a legal document contain
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Following this escalation of violen
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The governor of Debdou similarly pr
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custom and the sultan’s command.
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minister of foreign affairs, receiv
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Yet murder cases were not the only
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Moroccan legal system. On the one h
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In 1884 the Jews of Fez appealed to
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Although at first these appeals mig
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The Jews of Meknes appealed to the
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In other instances, Makhzan officia
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about their own coreligionists. The
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Europeans—a sentiment that at oth
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complain about their muḥtasib, em
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Chapter Seven: Foreign Protection a
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Perhaps most important, however, is
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of consular courts functioned throu
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of Muslims from becoming protégés
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cases between its own nationals or
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of consular courts by specifying th
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an important moment in the history
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were required to notify their consu
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dealt with cases by means other tha
Page 299 and 300: In other instances, consuls wrote t
Page 301 and 302: qāḍī” attesting a debt owed t
Page 303 and 304: The following two chapters examine
Page 305 and 306: clarify when and why he had taken t
Page 307 and 308: Even scholars who argue against see
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Page 311 and 312: of the individuals concerned. 31 Pr
Page 313 and 314: concerning the incident, which they
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Page 317 and 318: protection) of Yitzḥaq b. Nissim
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Page 321 and 322: Dinar Ohana), an American protégé
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Page 331 and 332: number of foreign subjects and prot
Page 333 and 334: By subjecting the suit to Moroccan
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Page 337 and 338: Foreign subjects and protégés wer
Page 339 and 340: confirmed that this meant the Jews
Page 341 and 342: AIU’s attention either through pe
Page 343 and 344: A competing narrative of Moroccan J
Page 345 and 346: non-Jewish Westerners alike, I argu
Page 347 and 348: international press. Demnat might s
Page 349: attribute the Makhzan’s efforts t
Page 353 and 354: finally wrote to Muḥammad Bargās
Page 355 and 356: wearing Muslim clothing and told hi
Page 357 and 358: of 1863. Four Jews were accused of
Page 359 and 360: made an honest mistake, the effect
Page 361 and 362: etracted his initial testimony clai
Page 363 and 364: the remaining two subjects. Only af
Page 365 and 366: organizations, and the foreign pres
Page 367 and 368: Marseillais, The Times, The Pall Ma
Page 369 and 370: coreligionists’ position. 112 Avn
Page 371 and 372: had been following the standard pra
Page 373 and 374: did not declare that Jews and Musli
Page 375 and 376: under the jurisdiction of Makhzan o
Page 377 and 378: tolerance. 142 Such a policy would
Page 379 and 380: concede to the American ambassador
Page 381 and 382: Epilogue On March 30, 1912, France
Page 383 and 384: courts to matters of personal statu
Page 385 and 386: This sort of continuity in legal pr
Page 387 and 388: intra-Jewish cases to these courts
Page 389 and 390: Glossary of Arabic and Hebrew Terms
Page 391 and 392: Ẓahīr: Royal decree (spelled “
Page 393 and 394: United States: United States Nation
Page 395 and 396: ———. Kitāb al-istiqṣā li-
Page 397 and 398: Becker, Jerónimo. España y Marrue
Page 399 and 400: Chetrit, Joseph. Diglossie, hybrida
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Ennaji, Mohammed. Expansion europé
Page 403 and 404:
Gotzmann, Andreas. “At Home in Ma
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———. Les protégés : contrib
Page 407 and 408:
Marcus, Abraham. The Middle East on
Page 409 and 410:
Perron, M. Précis de jurisprudence
Page 411 and 412:
———. “Forum Shopping Among
Page 413:
Cultural Dimensions, edited by Mich
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