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THE ZOHAR IN SOUTHERN MOROCCO:

A STUDY IN THE ETHNOGRAPHY OF TEXTS

{History of Religions 29:233-58, 1990; last draft before editing by journal.}

INTRODUCTION

It is more than thirty years since researchers first urged that textual scholars pay greater

attention to everyday behavior, and that anthropologists familiarize themselves with classic

religious literature. When Redfield first put forth the challenge to link the points of view of field

study and textually based disciplines, he cited work on Hinduism and Islam.1 This was a lead,

however, which only occasionally has been followed, and among the well known attempts in this

direction, in the anthropological literature, are those of Dumont with regard to the caste system in

India, and Tambiah's work on Sinhalese Buddhism.2 A recent study of Taoist liturgy has shown the

advantages of asking detailed questions about processes involved in the social use of texts, rather

than resting on a blanket generalized assumption that texts "reflect their social context."3 The

present paper seeks to understand the complex symbolic system reinforcing attachment to the Zohar

book among the Jews of southern Morocco.

The meeting point between social life and text has been presented from different

perspectives. A number of anthropological studies in the Middle East, the region with which this

paper is concerned, have pointed to correspondences between common conceptions of social life

and formal religious doctrine.4 These studies, however, do not focus on how the rank and file

members of society are exposed to the ideas, values and terminology found in the texts, i.e., the

question of how cultural matters spread from literate specialists to those who have acquired little

literacy or none at all. In order to pursue this issue, it is necessary to investigate how texts are

utilized in popular settings.

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A few studies of Middle Eastern Jewish communities have provided information of this

nature. Thus, Deshen has documented the "ritualization of literature" involved in the publishing of

manuscripts among Tunisian Jews who have settled in Israel.5 Stahl, also writing about Jews of

North African provenance, has documented the theological background of the communal reading of

the Zohar, and described some features of this common practice based on his own observations and

as reflected in ethnographic literature.6 The present paper will pursue this topic, seeking to

understand the multi-dimensioned centrality of the Zohar to Moroccan Jews in terms of other

aspects of their religious culture and of the wider sociocultural environment.7

THE RITUALIZATION OF TEXTS

Both Judaism and Islam stress that every individual should have knowledge of basic daily

liturgy, often composed of portions of scripture,8 and encourage further exposure to religious

learning. In reality, however, there were many individuals (the numbers and categories varying with

time and place), whose knowledge of the formal tradition was limited or non-existent. In this

situation the "ritualization" of texts, their insertion into standard liturgy, was one method which

guaranteed a minimal exposure to, and involvement in, sanctified texts on the part of the "simplest"

adherents to the faith. This process of ritualization, however, carries with it the problem, from the

point of view of monotheistic thought, that uninformed repetition of the hallowed words can turn

into hollow incantation, indicating "magical" attitudes as much as religious devotion.

The term "ritualization" thus has had several senses. On the one hand, it can be used, as in

the study of Taoism already mentioned,9 to indicate the process whereby canonical texts are made a

part of ritual. This has been a central feature in Jewish religious culture as well.10 The phrase,

however, can also imply, somewhat invidiously, that texts become "nothing but" ritual, so that their

pragmatic use, broadly conceived, overshadows their content. This latter use of the term

ritualization also carries connotations of "lack of knowledge" or of a popular "superstitious"

outlook. Without denying that religious experience based on extensive study may differ from that

which entails a minimum of systematic reflection, this paper will show that the ritualization of a

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text, in this case the Zohar among the Jews of southern Morocco, was parallel to developments

elsewhere in the religious life of Jewish communities, but also reflected patterns of the devotion to

saints which is a major feature of North African religion generally.

THE ZOHAR AND ITS IMPACT

The story of the Zohar and its impact is one of the striking episodes in the history of Jewish

mysticism and in the religious life of Jews generally.11 A pseudoepigraphic text, authored in the late

thirteenth century and attributed to a second century rabbinic sage, eventually was accepted

throughout the Jewish world. A critical phase in the spread of this text's influence involves the

sixteenth century mystic, Isaac Luria, who drew upon the Zohar, incorporating it into the standard

liturgy, and developing rituals inspired by his interpretation of its religious meaning.12 From Safed,

where Luria for a brief but culturally significant period stood in the center of a community of

kabbalists,13 these innovations spread to Jewish communities in both the Middle East and Europe.

Scholem has described the diffusion of Lurianic kabbalah as "the last movement in the history of

Rabbinic Judaism which gave expression to a world of religious reality common to the whole

people."14 There are several standard explanations for the success of the Zohar in capturing the

religious imagination of Jewish communities over the course of generations, and for becoming, in

Scholem's words, "a canonical text, which for a period of several centuries actually ranked with the

Bible and the Talmud."15 One explanation, which is central to Scholem's work even though it has

recently been questioned,16 is that kabbalistic thought among the Spanish exiles and their

descendants succeeded in merging mysticism with messianism, thereby creating interpretations of

the Zohar which held a powerful attraction in the wake of the trauma of the expulsion from Spain.

A second explanation, relating to the masses of Jews in places such as North Africa, was that this

religious message provided a needed solace to those living in depressed social and economic

circumstances.17 Both these explanations consist of broad-gauged correlations between aspects of

the Zohar, as interpreted by the Lurianic school, and very general features of Jewish society. They

pay little attention to the particular cultural milieu of the different regions in which attachment to

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the Zohar took hold.

The burden of this essay will be to demonstrate that while practices in local communities

have links to the "great tradition" of Jewish mysticism, and thus are parallel to customs found

generally in the Jewish world, they show, at the same time, characteristics and emphases that are

peculiar to their specific settings. Our focus will be on the small Jewish communities which were

scattered throughout southern Morocco, the area in which devotion to saints was another feature of

cultural prominence. It will be argued that the culture of "maraboutism," a theme reflected in much

of the recent anthropological writing on Morocco,18 which affected Jews as well as Muslims, is an

important factor in understanding the Moroccan Jews' relation to the Zohar.

THE ZOHAR IN MOROCCO

The centrality and the problematics of the Zohar among Moroccan Jews may be

underscored by reference to the work of Andre Chouraqui.19 In 1952, Chouraqui, himself born in a

small town in western Algeria, published an integrative work on the history and current situation of

North African Jewry. In outlining religious life in that region, he names the major historical

influences which have shaped the religious culture of North African Jews. His discussion of

mysticism highlights the importance of the Zohar, and he claims that "in certain centers" in

Morocco, the Zohar was treated with the same degree of sanctity as the Torah (the five books of

Moses), the Mishna and the Talmud.20 This statement, which one might see as portraying

Moroccan Jews as "blasphemers," or, at the very least, as superstitious and dreadfully lacking in

religious sophistication, is offered with no analysis or explanation. The present essay may be read

as an attempt to penetrate the meaning of Chouraqui's characterization of the attitude to the Zohar,

which appears to be "common sense" to many Moroccan Jews.

In Chouraqui's book, as in other general surveys of North African Jewry, two features that

are universally mentioned as being of special importance in religious life are the mystical tradition

(of which the Zohar is the most salient element), and the devotion to sainted rabbis (tzaddikim).

Indeed, these topics are often presented in a back to back fashion.21 Rarely, however, are they

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treated in relation to one another. This may be because the Zohar has become the central mystical

text of Jews everywhere, while the special relationship to saints is seen as reflecting something

peculiar to the North African setting. It is our thesis that, in the context of Moroccan society, these

two features of religious life became related in a mutually reinforcing manner.

In order to unravel the various levels of meaning associated with the popular reading of the

Zohar, we will first summarize the accepted views concerning the relationship between popular

maraboutism and mystical thought in North African Islam. Then, background material on the

Jewish communities in southern Morocco will be presented. The religious life of these communities

will be shown to include important features paralleling the devotion of saints, widespread in

Maghribi Muslim culture, and particularly prominent in Morocco. Just as students of maraboutism

have shown that it reflects a powerful interweaving of local sociological forces buttressed by ideas

stemming from a wider mystical tradition within Islam, our examination of local expressions of

Jewish mysticism, related to the Zohar book, will demonstrate how the Moroccan Jews' relationship

to the Zohar is tied to both a broader Jewish tradition of mysticism and to the specific North

African setting.

MARABOUTISM IN NORTH AFRICA

Various writers have discussed the social situations in North Africa in which the belief in

the existence of marabouts, who mediate between the average tribesman, villager, or town dweller,

and God, is grounded.22 In the tribal setting, political rivalries within segmentary societies give rise

to the need for human mediators, who gain legitimacy and sanctity through their relation to

ancestors capable of mediating between the human and the divine. Even in the setting of towns,

urban social structure throws into relief the need for "go-betweens" to broker links between rank-

and-file townsmen and powerful figures. These features of social reality also reinforce the

assumption that intercessors are necessary in relations with the supernatural. This commonsense

notion is buttressed by the mystical strand within Islam which lends legitimacy to the fact that there,

in fact, are individuals characterized by an excessive share of sanctity and divine blessing.

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While it is possible to be skeptical about any given individual claiming to be the seat of

such blessing, Islamic mystical tradition has interdigitated with local sociology to justify the notion

that, in principle, individuals possessing these blessings, and the attendant capabilities of curing,

working wonders, and so forth, do exist.23 While some of the ceremonial and organizational forms

of hagiolatry differed in the Jewish and Muslim communities,24 basic assumptions about the

existence and power of sainted individuals were shared by Muslims and Jews in traditional North

Africa, and most certainly among the communities in the South.

JEWISH COMMUNITIES IN SOUTHERN MOROCCO: THEIR RELIGIOUS CENTERS

Jewish communities have long been found in southern Morocco.25 Their location followed

the large river beds which served as caravan routes from the North to the South. While engaged in

aspects of long distance trade, Jews were also connected to the agricultural scene, and many worked

as craftsmen serving the local peasant population, in both Arabic-speaking and Berber-speaking

areas. Despite the continued migration of Jews out of the South, throughout the nineteenth century,

the same geographical distribution of communities held during the twentieth century, when

Flamand documented the existence of about 200 communities, tied to Marrakesh as a center.26 His

figures did not include the southeastern region of Tafilalt, tied more directly to Fez and Meknes,

which exhibited a similar pattern. In sum, there was a very widespread distribution of Jews, living

in small communities, in much of southern Morocco.27

The size of these communities was small, although it is hard to give precise numbers. The

vast majority of them had only one synagogue, a clear sign of their limited size which was

maintained by constant outmigration. A modal figure might run from 30 to 60 families, and there

were some communities, on the verge of disintegration, which had fewer than ten families,

consisting of just enough men of religious majority to constitute a prayer quorum. At the upper end,

several localities were large enough to require two or even three synagogues, and the few locales in

which there were four or more synagogues were in effect central towns. In any event, in the vast

majority of these sites, the Jews were residentially concentrated, and their collective life was

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centered in the synagogue as a locus and expression of their communal existence.

Another sacred place in each of these hamlets was the local cemetery, and almost all of the

Jewish settlements had their own, commonly known as the me`ara. The almost perfect correlation

of one cemetery to a community may be seen as a function of geographic dispersal, and the

inconvenience of sustaining a funeral cortege over great distances, but the cemetery (typically in a

distinct, and often opposite, direction from the local Muslim cemetery) also had a meaningful place

in the religious life, and communal definition, of the Jewish inhabitants. In, or close by every

Jewish cemetery, there was one grave distinguished from the rest which was recognized as the

burial place of a local tzaddik, or sainted rabbi. This was a regular pattern in addition to the more

well-known regional tzaddikim (plural), represented by venerated graves, which attracted Jews

from all over the country.

Many of the more than six hundred Moroccan Jewish saints cited in the compendium of

Ben-Ami28 probably were of this local variety, and were known primarly to devotees in their own,

and nearby communities. The stories extolling these saints repeated the same themes, their ability to

answer the prayers of supplicants to cure, match-make, and protect from dangers in the non-Jewish

environment. In this, they differed little, in principle, from local Muslim saints, and it was not

uncommon, in Morocco, for both Jews and Muslims to assert that a certain prominent grave was

"theirs," each claiming that the pious and powerful figure buried there had been (and continued,

even in "death" to act as) a Jew or a Muslim respectively.29

The tzaddikim or more properly, their graves (Moroccan Jews do not differentiate between

the two in their speech), were also the sites of ritual and celebration. One could come to the

cemetery at any time, light a candle at the graveside, and utter an individual prayer, but there were

also annual, community-wide celebrations known as hillulot (sing. hillula).30 These celebrations

had much in common with the musem-s in honor of Muslim saints, described in the ethnographic

literature,31 while there were differences as well.32 The hillulot brought together the whole

community, this totalizing experience often being expressed by the phrase that "men, women and

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children" all participated. People would visit the graveside, light candles, pray, sing hymns in honor

of the tzaddik, contribute to the poor, and share a festive meal. The meal would involve the ritual

slaughter of animals, underlining the linkage of solemnity and festivity. As indicated by Bilu,33 who

has studied these hillulot as they have been revived and continued among Moroccan Jews in Israel,

the atmosphere on these occasions easily fits the rubric of "communitas," elaborated in the work of

Victor Turner.34

The centrality of these celebrations (demonstrated by the fact that they have been

impressively revitalized in contemporary Israel) raises a puzzling sociological question. Given that

these communities were small, why did they need two separate foci of communal life, two centers,

as it were, of Durkheimian effervescence? Life in the synagogue every Sabbath, and certainly on the

festivals, during which all members of the community were at home,35 provided an occasion and

place for the expression of communal solidarity. It seems that the activities, ideas and sentiments

associated with the tzaddikim pointed in a different direction from that of institutionalized

synagogue life which conformed to norms followed by traditional Jewish communities everywhere.

HILLULOT AND THE CEMETERY

A close examination of activities associated with the hillula yields one hypothesis, that these

events were of special importance to women. It was women who frequently invoked the name of a

tzaddik, either a local one or a figure widely known, in their concern with the daily affairs of the

family, particularly with regard to matters of health. In the hillula itself, which is neither enjoined,

nor closely regulated, by ancient Jewish rules found in the Bible or Talmud, women can, in

principle, do everything that men do. Conventional norms may dictate that women should not

approach the graveside at the same time as men, but there is no class of behavior from which

women are formally barred. They can be as close to the tzaddik as men, a situation which is

substantially different from that obtaining in synagogue life, in which central ritual roles are not

open to women.

Upon further analysis, however, the special religious emphasis associated with the

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tzaddikim may relate not to women in particular, but, in general, may give greater religious

recognition to the individual than is normally expressed in synagogue. Conventional synagogue

routine is highly structured and shaped by a myriad of rules, formulated in canonical texts. The

obvious imprints of local influences notwithstanding, these rules allow relatively little room for

innovation and individual expression. The North African pilgrimage tradition, whether it be to a

far-away shrine, or to the local cemetery, is more optional and flexible, and is not encumbered by a

time-honored bundle of complex requirements and prohibitions. (One should obviously observe the

detailed proscriptions which govern daily life during hillulot as well, and women are expected not

to visit a tzaddik during periods of menstrual impurity.) Pilgrimages are therefore a more congenial

setting for venting one's deepest idiosyncratic and personal wishes.

That this openness to individual expressions of religiosity should take place in a cemetery

should not be surprising, for as emphasized by Bloch and Parry,36 biological death is an event

which highlights the separateness of the individual, no matter how successful a society is in

impressing a group identity on its members. While Bloch and Parry suggest that funeral rites in

many tribal societies work to suppress the sense of individuality,37 it seems likely that in the case

we are considering, and perhaps in other "great traditions" as well, death-related ceremonies are

utilized to underline the valorization of the individual within an overall set of cultural ideals, most

of which stress conformity to group norms. It may be that, as suggested by Turner and Turner, with

regard to Jesus in Christian hagiolatry, that the distinctiveness of the saint in the cemetery of each

small community becomes a trope for individual distinction, in general.38 Be that as it may, it is

instructive to examine more closely certain aspects of social organization and religious tradition

connected with the cemetery and the process of burial in the small Moroccan Jewish communities.

BURIAL AND THE SOCIETY OF RABBI SHIM`ON

In Jewish communities everywhere, there is a special association of individuals concerned

with funerals. They wash the body, wrap it in shrouds, and organize the rituals associated with

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internment. The most common name for this society is the hevra qaddisha, the "holy society," the

society concerned with the most serious matter of organizing the termination of a human life in this

world.

In many small communities of North Africa, the hevra qaddisha was known simply as "the

hevra,"39 suggesting that it was the voluntary organization, par excellence. This was certainly true

in the communities of southern Morocco where it was the only voluntary association. In larger

communities, there are many such associations, devoted to various religious ends such as collecting

money for the poor, raising funds to marry off orphaned girls, visiting the sick and so forth. These

activities took place in the southern Moroccan communities, but were embedded in the routine life

of families, and were not necessarily the task of differentiated, special purpose, groups.

The members of the hevra were usually older, or at least mature men, but it was more a

matter of sobriety and personal piety than age that made them fit for the task. When a person

wished to join the group, it would have to reflect both community consensus, and the agreement of

other members of the group. The esteem with which the group was held in the eyes of the

community at large was expressed in a se`uda (festive meal) given in its honor, once a year (the

date or occasion varied), by members of the community. Upon the death of a female, the body

would be prepared by women counterparts to the hevra, who were given less public recognition.

In many areas of Morocco, and particularly in the South, the burial association had an even

more specific name: hevrat rebbi shim`on (the hevra of Rabbi Shim`on).40 Rabbi Shim`on here

refers to Rabbi Shim`on Bar-Yohai, a second century Mishnaic sage, who is the putative author of

the Zohar.41 The association with Rabbi Shim`on is made manifest through the fact that, in addition

to their activities as part of the burial association, members of the hevra met at least once a week

(e.g., Thursday nights, Saturday nights) for ritual readings and study of the Zohar.42 It appears that

the part of the Zohar which they normally read was the Idra, or the last section, which deals with the

death of Rabbi Shim`on Bar Yohai. Aspects of the text reinforce the associations suggested above.

Thus, the Idra indicates that the word "life" was the last uttered by the sainted rabbi, and states that

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at the time of his departure two biblical verses, stressing the theme of life, were mysteriously heard.

Mention might also be made of the fact that the common Judeo-Arabic term for cemetery in

Morocco, me`ara (derived from the Hebrew word for cave), appears in the Idra in describing Rabbi

Shim`on's burial place. In larger communities, the hevra of Rabbi Shimon consisted of a Zohar

reading group, which was not necessarily identical with the burial society. Nevertheless, the

interweaving of three elements: the cemetery and sainted graves or tombs, Rabbi Shim`on Bar-

Yohai, and the Zohar book is unmistakable. Before proceeding with the analysis of the Zohar in the

context of Moroccan communities, however, some general comments about the Zohar and Rabbi

Shim`on Bar Yohai are in order.

THE ZOHAR AND RABBI SHIM`ON BAR YOHAI

The Zohar is a mystical tract, structured as a commentary on the Bible, written in a

medieval style of Hebrew /Aramaic. It represents the culmination of Spanish Jewish mysticism in

the thirteenth century, and its main author appears to have been Moses de Leon. When the Zohar

appeared within the Jewish world in the late thirteenth century, however, it was not presented as a

recent creation, but the claim was made that it was a book revealed to Rabbi Shim`on Bar-Yohai.

According to a story in the Talmud,43 Bar-Yohai spent twelve years in a cave in the Galilee,

hiding from the Romans. Kabbalistic tradition has it that it was during this period that he was

initiated into the secret knowledge later to appear in the Zohar. The Zohar, however, was kept

"hidden" for over one thousand years until it began circulating in Spain in the late thirteenth and

early fourteenth century. There are traditions which claim that it was discovered in southern

Morocco,44 a notion that bolsters our assumption of a special importance attributed to the Zohar in

that region. In any event, it was quickly accepted in wide circles within Jewry that this was, in fact,

an ancient book containing esoteric religious knowledge, directly written by, or revealed to, Rabbi

Shim`on Bar-Yohai.

As indicated above, the importance of the Zohar in Jewish life is not confined to the period

of its "discovery," for over the generations its influence and popularity spread. Two stages may be

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highlighted in the present context. One, as stated, is the intensive development of mystical activity

among the scholars of Safed in the mid-sixteenth century. From Safed, these innovations spread to

Jewish communities in both the Middle Eastern and European Jewish worlds.

A second stage in the impact of kabbalah in everyday Jewish life, which is only peripheral

to the theme of this paper, is represented by the movement of Hasidism which took place in

southeastern Poland-Lithuania in the eighteenth century. We mention this currently, simply because

it is one example of a significant religious and social development which attached great importance

to kabbalah, and by implication, to the Zohar, which is partially parallel to the impact of the Zohar

in the life of rural North African Jews.

A contemporary expression of this attachment that is directly relevant to our topic, is the

hagiolatry associated with the name of Rabbi Shim`on Bar Yohai. About ten miles northwest of

Safed is Mt. Meron (the highest mountain in the Galilee), on whose slopes stands a mausoleum

generally recognized as Bar Yohai's tomb. The historicity of this identification is of no interest to us

here, for, from early modern times onward, this tomb has been viewed as his burial place,45 and has

been the site of a pilgrimage on the day of his hillula, called lag ba-`omer,46 which falls 33 days

after Passover. This pilgrimage has attracted Jews of Middle Eastern background and certain

Hasidic groups as well. The special ties of North African Jewry to Rabbi Shim`on Bar-Yohai can be

vividly witnessed today, as his shrine, in contemporary Israel, consistently attracts about 150,000

pilgrims on this date. By far the largest category of people coming to "visit" the sainted rabbi on his

hillula are Jews of North African origin.

In addition to the term lag ba`omer (or lag la'omer), North Africans sometimes refer to the

fete of Rabbi Shim`on as hillula rabati (using a formal sounding Aramaic adjective) or li-hilula li-

kbira (in Maghribi Arabic vernacular), both meaning: the Great hillula. This usage may stem from

the fact that the term hillula, which in the Talmud refers to a celebration after a wedding, is used in

the Zohar to indicate a celebration associated with Bar Yohai's death (the notion being that his soul

returns and is "wedded" to its original divine source). The phrase also recognizes that Rabbi

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Shim`on's hillula is one of various celebrations of saints which takes place throughout the year,47

but clearly is the most central of all and, in a sense, the prototype of the others.

In the North African setting, Maghribi tzaddikim had certain days upon which their hillula

was marked, but in many instances the day was not in fact the actual death day of a given historical

individual, but was lag ba`omer. Local saints were thus metonymically linked to Rabbi Shim`on,

while also standing in metaphoric relation to him. In lieu of visiting the burial place of the saint, par

excellence (Rabbi Shim`on), Jews living in Morocco could be present at the graveside of a local

saint who, in addition to his own sanctity, reverberated with hints of the epitome of sainthood. For

example, a hymn commonly sung on many such occasions (whether it was lag ba-`omer or not) was

a paean in honor of Bar-Yohai authored by a prominent sixteenth century kabbalist.48 In this

manner, the existence of a figure such as Bar-Yohai in the mystical tradition legitimated the

institution of sainthood at the local level in small Moroccan communities.49 With this overview

concerning the Zohar, and devotional acts invoking Bar-Yohai, it is possible to return to a more

detailed consideration of the Zohar book in the setting of southern Moroccan Jewish life.

TEXTS IN MOROCCAN COMMUNITIES: THE TORAH

The small communities in southern Morocco were linked to the "great tradition" of

Judaism, but direct access to sacred texts was usually limited. Normally, women were given no

schooling. Men learned to read in the context of synagogue training, at a young age, but even some

of them never completely mastered the principles. Most eventually learned to read the prayers, or

more precisely, to recite them by heart, and many could apply the mechanics of reading to other

Hebrew texts as well. Knowing how "to read," however, implied the ability to link the written text

to the correct sounds, but not necessarily to understand their meaning. At the same time, in every

community, there were some individuals with a broader and deeper knowledge and understanding

of these texts.50

It goes without saying that the few texts which functioned in the lives of these communities

were all religious texts. Their sanctity was enhanced by the fact that books were not easy to

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obtain.51 In principle, every adult male would acquire a personal prayer book (typically purchased

in a city, such as Marrakesh) at the age of Bar Mitzvah, which he would keep to be used on a daily

basis with his prayer shawl and phylacteries. A family might, or might not, have a printed Bible or a

few other religious texts in their homes. The synagogue would normally have a number of printed

Bibles, which included translations of and commentaries on the Pentateuch, and some other

volumes which served liturgical purposes also could be found there. The central texts in the

synagogue, however, were the Torah Scrolls, housed in the heichal,52 and a set or sets of the Zohar

book.

The Torah scroll was "the book" in the synagogue, as the term, the sefer, normally applied

to it in the North African tradition, implies.53 It is essentially the presence of a Torah scroll that

turns a room or building into a synagogue. For ritual purposes it is necessary to read from such a

scroll, hand written on parchment, and in order to function smoothly a synagogue needs several of

them. Torah scrolls, while utilized in a communal context, were, in many North African

communities, the property of individuals who had paid the money to have them written by a scribe.

This was a major financial undertaking. A scroll would be ordered from a scribe, who generally

resided in one of the major towns, and who would complete the task over a period of many months.

Because of the amount of work involved, the sums paid were significant. Contributing to the

community by providing a Torah scroll, therefore, was a source both of prestige and religious merit.

It was a major communal event when a new Torah Scroll was brought to a synagogue.54

Often the Scroll would be kept at the home of the donor for a while, awaiting an appropriate

occasion for the ceremony of "accompaniment," in which the scroll was formally placed in the

synagogue. During this period of time, an order might be placed with a specialist carpenter to

prepare the decorative housing into which the scroll was placed. There also may have been some

notion that the presence of a sefer in the house was propitious, thereby prolonging its "residence"

there.55 When the total ensemble, of scroll plus housing was ready for formal presentation to the

synagogue, it involved a procession in which men walked slowly, with singing and chanting, from

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the home of the donor to the synagogue. Because of the great merit associated with these occasions,

many different men would take turns at carrying the sefer and gradually arrive at the synagogue.

Women followed behind, also contributing to the festivity with their ululations. Events such as

these could also involve a religious lesson, and most certainly a festive meal, provided by the donor,

for all the participants.

RITUAL USE OF THE ZOHAR BOOK

The above general description, of the accompaniment of a sefer, or Torah scroll, into a

synagogue, is, in its major outlines, common throughout traditional Jewry. What is unusual about

the Jews of southern Morocco is that they engaged in a similar round of ceremonies when a new set

of Zohar books was introduced into their communities. The Zohar is not required to be written on

parchment, but is printed, and can be used, ritually, in the printed form. Aside from this fact, the

form of reverence paid to the Zohar parallels rather directly the honor bestowed upon the Torah

scrolls.

In fact, among its other virtues, the Zohar may have allowed those who could not afford to

support the writing of a Torah scroll, to make a significant contribution to synagogue life by being

responsible for the acquisition of a Zohar. To buy a printed set of Zohar volumes was much less

expensive than purchasing a sefer, but even this was out of the financial reach of many village

dwellers. The affective value associated with purchasing a Zohar and bringing it to the community

was brought home by one informant, from a community south of Marrakesh, who described how

this had been done in pre-motorized days by one of his friends. The trip from Marrakesh to this

locale took four days, and the friend in question did this often while bringing merchandise to the

region from the urban market. Normally, merchandise was packed on the back of donkeys, while

the merchants walked on foot. On the occasion when this acquaintance purchased the Zohar books,

he carried the set on his back for four days, not wanting to desecrate it by putting it on the back of

the beast of burden.56 In this case, as in others, members of the community were aware that a Zohar

was scheduled to arrive, and it was greeted by the villagers at the outskirts of the settlement, from

16

whence the procession of bringing it into the synagogue began. In such processions, the honor of

carrying the Zohar several steps was often auctioned, in a manner similar to the "sale" of the ritual

honors in the synagogue.

The treatment of the Zohar was thus quite similar to the treatment of a Torah scroll. The

Zohar, in fact, was placed in a specially prepared container during the procession, and people

sought to take turns carrying it, amidst the chants which characterized such occasions. In addition,

the Zohar had a set place in the synagogues, although what this place was differed from one

synagogue to the next. In one case it is reported as having been kept in the ark side by side with the

sefer, in another -- on a shelf just below the Torah scrolls, and in a third -- on a shelf just opposite

the heichal. In each instance, however, there was an established location in which the Zohar was

ceremoniously situated, and it was not placed down casually on any convenient table or shelf.57

There was one major difference, however, in the treatment of the Torah scroll and the Zohar

book. Once brought into the synagogue, the Torah scroll was never removed from it. This might

only be done when the Torah was no longer fit for ritual reading, and could not be repaired. In such

circumstances it coud simply stay in the ark, even for many years, if there were room enough, but

eventually, according to standard Jewish law, would be buried in a cemetery in a manner analogous

to the burial of a human being. In recent history, when the Moroccan Jews left the villages in the

South during the course of the 1950s and 1960s, they took care to bury the unusable scrolls, or

those that they could not take with them. Others were dismantled from their wooden cases and

brought with the immigrants when they abandoned their villages.

In contrast to the Torah Scroll, which remained permanently in the synagogue, the Zohar

book would be removed from the synagogue to individual homes, "reside" in these homes for a day

or so, and then be returned to the synagogue. Standard occasions for "visits" on the part of the

Zohar were the anniversary of a death, or the eve of a circumcision, during which a type of "vigil"

took place,58 which included prescribed readings from sections of the Zohar. Other instances

involved cases of sickness which seemed difficult, in the course of which the Zohar would be

17

brought into the home.59 These occasions entailed an invitation to the members of hevrat rebbi

shim`on to do the reading, as well as to other guests. Preparing a meal for the invitees was a normal

part of these events. There was a sense that the presence of the Zohar in the house could have a

beneficial effect on the ill person, but it also was felt that it was not prudent to keep the book in the

house too long, so that usually it would be returned after several days. Every move of the Zohar,

from the synagogue, or back again, required a formal procession with hymns and all the signs of

respect due to the venerated book.

There was thus a clear contrast between the Torah scroll and Zohar book, on the

background of the overall similarity in attitude toward them. The Zohar was more accessible (even

in terms of its purchase price), and could be brought into the lives of individuals, particularly at

times of personal crises, while the Torah remained "remote," in its own place. People could make

personal requests "in the presence of" the Torah scroll in the synagogue,60 or women could utter

prayers, on behalf of themselves and their families, when the sefer was raised for viewing as part of

the synagogue service. But people had to come to the Torah scroll; the Torah would not "come to"

individual people. (Another way of "representing" the Torah within the home was to bring one of

its appurtenances, such as a decorative cloth, to a house on the occasion of a circumcision, illness

and so forth.)

While in other Jewish groups the Zohar was read on the night of circumcisions, or other books

might be used to express deeply personal prayers and sentiments,61 it is only, to my knowledge, in

the southern Moroccan communities that ceremonial life institutionalized a clear structural

opposition highlighting the difference between the Zohar and the Torah. The logic here is precisely

that outlined by Abu-Zahra in her study of a Tunisian village,62 where the necessity of leaving one's

own place to visit others, as opposed to the ability to stay in one's own home and be visited by

people, is one of the salient markers of social weakness versus strength, or lower prestige as

contrasted with higher social value. This perception guides relations among living people, as well

as between humans and deceased saints. From this point of view, the Zohar is clearly of lower

18

status than the Torah, even though they are both objects of veneration.

The argument here is, in fact, directly parallel to the one put forward by many students of

religion when explaining the importance attached to saints by Muslims, or indeed, by adherents to

other monotheistic traditions. This explanation stresses that God, in strict monotheistic thought,

stands far above the world, and that it is difficult for the simple, unschooled believer to feel that

such an omnipotent deity takes any special interest in her or his personal desires or prayers. The

image of a saint, an intermediary between the humble human and the Almighty, helps fill this void,

for it makes sense that such a mediate being can be related to the supplicant individual in one

direction and to the All-Powerful in the other.63 In such a situation, it often has been commented

(sometimes in a critical vein), that a given category of people seems more attached to its saints than

to God. It is from this perspective that Chouraqui's statement, cited at the outset, to the effect that

the Zohar is treated "equally " to the Torah, is best understood. In the life of the ordinary Moroccan

Jewish villager, the Zohar can be brought closer to an individual than can the Torah. Our thesis is

easily summed up in a structuralist formulation: Zohar : Torah :: Saint : God.

THE CULTURAL MATRIX OF THE ZOHAR IN MOROCCO

The symbolic "logic" of sainthood, so powerful in the cultural environment of southern

Morocco, was absorbed by the Jews, not only in the obvious form of the multitude of Moroccan

Jewish saints, but into an altogether different idiom as well, that of books. One outcome of this

trope, is that the influence of the environment became nearly invisible, as the Zohar is seen as

eminently a matter of internal Jewish life, not at all shared with Muslims. Informants, when asked,

told me that Muslims knew something of the Torah, but were totally ignorant of the Zohar.

Schroeter, for example, in his study of the town of Essaouira, emphasizes that the Zohar was read

late at night/early morning, when the Jews were enclosed in the mellah (Jewish quarter) and

followed aspects of their tradition which differed markedly from that of the surrounding Muslims

with whom the Jews were in contact during daytime hours.64 In order to bolster the interpretation

that the two phenomena of Moroccan sainthood and attachment ot the Zohar are connected, some

19

further comparative data, focusing on other Jewish contexts as well as other Moroccan contexts,

will be considered. These comparisons will highlight the precise nature of the symbolic processes at

work in the setting of our concern.

At a very general level, the transference of a mode of thought concerning people (saints) to

the realm of books (and the reverse), is very ancient and widespread in Jewish culture.65 It

undoubtedly can be found in other traditions as well, but this does not detract from appreciating its

pervasiveness in many different Jewish symbolic settings. It also leads to an interesting question

concerning our thesis when applied to customs linked to the Great hillula of Rabbi Shim`on Bar-

Yohai, in Safed, and another central hillula, of Rabbi Meir Ba`al ha-Ness, buried in Tiberias,66

which predates Rabbi Shim`on`s fete by four days.

In the case of both of these celebrations, there is a custom that a Torah scroll from one of

the old Sephardi synagogues of the town (the `Abu synagogue in Safed, the Abulafia synagogue in

Tiberias) is taken out and paraded to the saint's mausoleum on the day of celebration. If our analysis

of the logic of "visiting" is correct, however, this should be, by implication at least, a

"blasphemous" act, in that it appears to acknowledge the superiority of the saint over the Torah, for

the Torah scroll leaves its own abode to visit the saint. Upon inquiring in the Tiberias synagogue

about how the custom was carried out in detail, it was explained that when the Torah is removed for

this purpose, a few of the stitches holding the leaves of parchment together are cut, thereby

invalidating it for ritual use. In other words, it is temporarily demoted from its status of full

holiness. The reason this is done, it was explained, is that there is a fear that the Torah scroll might

inadvertently fall, as part of the excitement and celebration, and this is considered to be a major

desecration. It takes the edge off such an untoward event, however, if the Torah scroll, is not in a

state of full sanctity. This reason is a straightforward rational one, from the point of view of

rabbinic law,67 and does not depend on a theory of sainthood and prestige expressed by visiting

patterns. At the same time it accords perfectly with the meanings of the acts that we have imputed

to people's handling of the Zohar or the Torah. By temporarily "demoting" the Torah, or, in a sense,

20

turning it into a non-Torah (i.e., an ordinary "Bible"), it can participate at a popular level, along

with the other people, in honoring the divine saint with a visit. A second ethnographic realm, this

time from southern Morocco itself, points to a similar configuration of elements. This concerns the

institution of oaths. One of the interesting features of Berber social organization is the collective

oath,68 wherein a man accused of a certain offence will swear, as will his patrilineal kin, that he is

not guilty of the act imputed to him. Presumably, fear of supernatural retribution is the motive

which prevents kinsmen from agreeing to participate in such an oath, unless they are confident that

they are testifying to the truth with regard to their lineage-mate`s behavior. The most immediate

representatives of supernatural power were Muslim saints, and such oaths normally took place at

the site of maraboutic shrines to which a given group held an attachment.

Taking an oath at the tomb of a saint, was thus established practice in the area, and was

utilized in the context of courts in southern Morocco during the period of the Protectorate, with

regard to both Berbers and Arabs, and with respect to single litigants (as opposed to collective

oaths). According to my information for the town of Erfoud in the Tafilalt, when a Muslim was

required to swear, an officer of the court would accompany him to a maraboutic shrine, the litigant

would take the oath, and the official would certify in court that the oath had been taken. A Jew,

however, who was required by the court to take an oath, did not do so at the tomb of a Jewish saint,

but was taken to the synagogue and took an oath in the presence of a Torah scroll.

The parallelism between a book (the Torah) and a person (the deceased saint) is made clear,

but seems to place the Muslim saint at the same level of sanctity as the Jews' holiest book. A bit of

information provided by one informant from Erfoud, coupled with a request that I not write down

what he was about to tell me, helps place these procedures in a local Jewish perspective.69 This

informant said that often the Jews would cut one of the stitches in the Torah scroll (similar to the

case of the hillula cited above), therefore depriving it of its full degree of sanctity. It is possible to

see this tactic as cynical manipulation ("with an 'unfit' Torah we can lie as much as we please"),

carried out by a minority group which perceives morality as confined to its own internal boundaries.

21

An equally plausible (and non-contradictory) explanation could point to a general reluctance to

swear in the presence of the Torah, the most sanctified cult item in Jewish life, for even if one

believes he is telling the complete truth, who can stand up to the scrutiny of the Omniscient?70 It is

thus understandable that given the choice, Jews would prefer to swear with some sort of Torah-

substitute, and generally be extremely careful about relating to the Torah as if it easily can be bent

to the ends of specific individuals pursuing their mundane interests. Given this attitude, and the

general sociocultural situation in Moroccan life which stressed the importance of intermediaries, it

makes perfect sense that Jews would seize upon valid symbolic "representatives" of the Torah

whenever possible, including the Zohar book.

As indicated above, one of the major steps in the insertion of the Zohar within the lives of

Jewish communities, generally, was its development at the hands of Isaac Luria and his disciples in

sixteenth century Safed. In succeeding decades and generations, various liturgical innovations,

linked to portions of the Zohar, and often involving reading segments thereof, were spread

throughout the Jewish world. These innovations reached North Africa, to a great extent via rabbinic

emissaries (shelihim) who periodically came to the Maghrib from Palestine.71 In this manner certain

notions concerning the Zohar were widely diffused, and helped formed the general ideological

background for Zohar adoration as it took shape in southern Morocco.

One of the most prominent of these rabbinic emissaries was Rabbi Hayyim Yosef David

Azulai. Born in Palestine, of a Maghribi family, Azulai traveled widely in Europe, spent time in

North Africa, and published on a vast range of topics.72 In one of his works, he exhorts people to

read from the Zohar, which he sees as contributing to personal spiritual regeneration. Having

traveled extensively within the Jewish world, Azulai knew that many Jews were only partially

schooled in the literacy skills necessary to read the Zohar with precision, and was fully aware that

the Zohar was not a text that was simple to comprehend. He nevertheless stressed the merit

involved in such reading, and insists upon the religious value of the act, even if mistakes are made

in pronunciation.73

22

I do not think that most Jews in southern Morocco were aware of the learned opinions,

expressed in scholarly tracts, concerning the reading of the Zohar, but Azulai's claim comfortably

fits the atmosphere of accessibility which was linked to the Zohar, in contrast to the Torah. It is an

ancient commandment to study (read), and re-study the Torah, but a claim that even inaccurate

reading carries religious reward could hardly be made with regard to it.74 Correct reading of the

Torah in a ritual context is an uncompromising imperative. I have seen, in Moroccan synagogues,

how the congregation loudly corrects the reader if he makes the slightest deviation, even in the

cantillation attached to the Torah text, to say nothing of the pronunciation of the proper vowels and

consonants. This flexibility associated with the Zohar, which allows it to be read in an inexact

fashion, is another facet of its accessibility. It is part of the general mystical tradition associated

with the book, and easily meshes with the logic of Moroccan sainthood so congenial to the constant

creation of intermediaries.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

The centrality of the Zohar book in the life of Jews in southern Morocco must be

understood on the background of its place in Jewish religious culture generally, but also should be

viewed in the framework of religious ideas that were constitutive of everyday life among both Jews

and Muslims in that region. Achieving such an understanding requires contributions from the

perspectives of both textually-based religious studies and field data of an anthropological nature. By

focusing on local settings in which literate culture interdigitates with everyday life, an appreciation

of the mechanisms and strength of its influence is achieved. Rather than resting on stilted contrasts

between religious and magical attitudes, or even between the written and the oral, the pinpointing of

local contexts illuminates the interpenetration, in actual life, of analytically distinguished aspects of

culture process. My Moroccan informants, most of whom had a rudimentary understanding of the

Zohar text, insisted that one only read the Zohar in the presence of a mekubbal, a man who had

received knowledge from a teacher who was part of the chain of esoteric wisdom. Such individuals

were identified in each village in southern Morocco, even though they might have been only

23

slightly more educated in kabbalistic understanding than those who read the Zohar with them.

These local literati, in turn, had studied for several years in larger centers (Marrakesh, Meknes),

constituting part of a network which ultimately tied together the most sophisticated savants with the

minimally schooled village dweller. The "popular" attitudes to the Zohar that we have discussed,

such as its apotropaic uses, were one facet of a complex phenomenon which also served to spread

and maintain kabbalistic traditions in all levels of Jewish society.

Our argument has sought to explain one aspect of the growing influence of the Zohar book,

which initially was circulated among a limited group of mystics, but eventually came to affect large

segments of Jewry. It is suggested that local social and religious factors, in other regions in which

the Zohar was popularized, may also have played a part in its specific reception (or non-reception)

in those areas. In conclusion, after having argued that the Zohar, and various ideas associated with

it, demonstrated an "elective affinity" to the cultural logic of sainthood in southern Morocco, I

speculate that issues of popular religion revolving around the mediation of sanctity may have

formed part of the cultural milieu in which the Zohar was originally written, and may be reflected in

it.

Both Morocco and thirteenth-century Spain form part of a broader Mediterranean region in

which notions of sainthood, diverse in their expressions and contexts, have long been present. For

example, in the portion of the Zohar describing the death of Rabbi Shim`on, it records a concern

among the people of Meron (in which he was buried), that another village might succeed in having

the saint buried with them. The symbolic linkage of a saint to a locality, and rivalry among towns in

terms of their saints, has long been common to both the Christian and Muslim regions of the

Mediterranean.

Another passage of the Zohar, well-known because of its incorporation into the standard

liturgy of the synagogue, states: "We [the people of Israel] trust not in man, nor rely on the son of

God, but only in the God of Heaven..."75 While some scholars (who translate the phrase "son of

God" as "angel," based on Daniel 3:25) have been uncomfortable with the passage, others assume

24

that here (and elsewhere in the Zohar), there is an explicit polemic with Christian belief in Jesus'

divine nature. In terms of our main topic, it is noteworthy that this passage forms part of a

supplication that the Zohar recommends be recited when the Torah scrolls are removed from the

heichal before public reading. At this point in the prayer service, when the Torah is lifted high in

front of the congregation, and then paraded among the male worshippers before being opened and

read, those present raise their eyes to the scroll, kiss it directly or with the touch of prayer shawl or

prayer book, and gently bow. The Torah, the recognized object of mediation between God and

Israel, is treated with acts of adoration somewhat parallel to those attached to Christian images and

processions of saints.76 It is further noteworthy that the same supplication contains prayers for the

mundane requirements of individuals, protection and sustenance, that are often directed toward

"saints," in Christianity, Judaism and Islam. The Zohar not only takes issue with Christian doctrine,

but seeks to insure that those needs of worshippers which are often met by mediate figures are

correctly channeled in the context of Jewish worship. If our speculation is correct, the author of the

Zohar was not only reacting to his Christian environment in terms of pure theology, but in terms of

common expressions of devotion which were part of daily life Spain. The Zohar, suffused with

ancient Jewish metaphors and theosophic speculation, perhaps may also be read, in some of its

passages, in terms of its proximate sociocultural environment.

Harvey E. Goldberg

Hebrew University of Jerusalem 1.. R. Redfield, "The Social Organization of Tradition," Far Eastern Quarterly 15 (1955): 13-22.

2.. L. Dumont, Homo Hierarchicus (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970); and S. Tambiah, Buddhism and the Spirit Cults in North-East Thailand (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970).

3.. C. Bell, "Ritualization of Texts and Textualization of Ritual in the Codification of Taoist Liturgy," History of Religions 27 (1988): 366-392.

25

4.. R. Antoun, "On the Modesty of Women in Arab Muslim Villages: A Study in the Accommodation of Traditions," American Anthropologist 70 (1968): 671-97 and the criticism by N. Abu-Zahra, "On the Modesty of Women in Arab Villages: A Reply," American Anthropologist 72 (1970): 1079-88; C. Geertz, H. Geertz and L. Rosen, Meaning and Order in Moroccan Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979); M. Meeker, Literature and Violence in Northern Arabia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979); and L. Rosen, Bargaining for Reality (Chicago: University of Chicago

Press, 1984).

5.. S. Deshen, "The Ritualization of Literacy: The Works of Tunisian Scholars in Israel," American Ethnologist 2 (1975): 251-259.

6.. A. Stahl, "Ritualistic Reading among Oriental Jews," Anthropological Quarterly 52 (1979): 115-120; and "Ritual Reading of the Zohar," Pe`amim 5 (1980): 77-86. On the continuation of Zohar reading sessions among Moroccan Jews in Israel see S. Deshen and M. Shokeid, The Predicament of Homecoming: Cultural and Social Life of North African Immigrants in Israel (Ithaca: Cornell

University Press, 1974), pp. 43, 75, 145 and the picture on p. 121.

7.. I am grateful to Moshe Idel and Daniel Matt for discussions concerning this paper, and for pointing me to important textual references. The fieldwork reflected herein was supported by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Science Foundation.

8.. The term scripture, when examined in detail in social context, may be misleading, for in Islam the correct oral recitation of the Qur'an is the highest form of its textual embodiment. See K.

Nelson, The Art of Reading the Qur'an (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1985). For the Moroccan setting, see D. Eickelman, Knowledge and Power in Morocco: The Education of a Twentieth-Century Notable (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985), chap. 3.

9.. C. Bell (n. 3 above).

10.. H. Goldberg, ed., Judaism Viewed from Within and from Without: Anthropological Studies (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987), pp. 28-32, 315-327.

11.. See G. Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism (New York: Schocken, 1961), chaps 3 and 4; and D. Matt, ed., Zohar: Book of Enlightenment (New York: Paulist Press, 1983), pp. 3-32.

12.. See G. Scholem (n. 11 above), chap. 6.

26

13.. S. Schechter, "Safed in the Sixteenth Century - A City of Legists and Mystics," in Studies in Judaism, vol. II. (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1908), pp. 182-285.

14.. G. Scholem (n. 11 above), p. 286.

15.. G. Scholem (n. 11 above), p. 156.

16.. M. Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988), pp. 264-267.

17.. H. Z. Hirschberg, "The Oriental Jewish Communities," in Religion in the Middle East: Three Religions in Concord and Conflict, vol. I, ed. A. J. Arberry (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969), pp. 175-176.

18.. C. Geertz, Islam Observed (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968); D. Eickelman, Moroccan Islam (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1976), and The Middle East (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1981), pp. 228-234; M. Gilsenan, Recognizing Islam (London:

Croom Helm, 1982), pp. 75-94; P. Rabinow, Symbolic Domination (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1975); E. Gellner, Saints of the Atlas (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969), and Muslim Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981); V. Crapanzano, The Hamadsha (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973); and N. Abu-Zahra, Sidi Ameur (London: Ithaca Press, 1982).

19.. See A. Chouraqui, Marche Vers l'Occident: Les Juifs d'Afrique du Nord (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1952), pp. 276ff.

20.. Chouraqui (n. 19 above), pp. 276, 281, uses the phrase "a l'egal de..." In an English version of the work, published later, Chouraqui is somewhat more circumspect and claims that the Zohar was "almost equal" to the Torah. See his Between East and West: A History of the Jews of North Africa (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1968), p. 104.

21.. See, for example, H. Z. Hirschberg, (note 17, above); S. Bar-Asher, "The Jews in North Africa and Egypt," in History of the Jews in the Islamic Countries, vol. I, ed. S. Ettinger (Jerusalem: Shazar Center, 1981), p. 188; and M. Laskier, The Alliance Israelite Universelle and the Jewish Communities of Morocco, 1862-

1962 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1983), pp. 23-24.

22.. See note 18, above.

27

23.23.. M. Gilsenan (n. 18 above).

24.. See H. E. Goldberg, "Potential Polities: Jewish Saints in the Moroccan Countryside and in Israel," Conference on Religious Regimes and State Formation. Amsterdam: June 22-26, 1987.

25.. C. de Foucauld, Reconnaissance au Maroc, 1883-1884 (Paris: Societe d'editions geographiques, 1888); P. Flamand, Les communautes israelites du Sud marocain (Casablanca: 1959); and H.

Goldberg, "The Mellahs of Southern Morocco: Report of a Survey," The Maghreb Review 8, no. 3-4 (1983), pp. 61-69.

26.. P. Flamand (n. 25 above).

27.. Ethnographic research carried out among Moroccan Jews who migrated to Israel also has enriched the knowledge of these communities. See, for example, A. Weingrod, Reluctant Pioneers: Village Development in Israel (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1966); D. Willner, Nation-building and Community in Israel (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969); and M. Shokeid, The Dual Heritage: Immigrants from the Atlas Mountains in an Israeli

Village (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1971).

28.. I. Ben-Ami, Veneration des Saints chez les Juifs du Maroc (Jerusalem: Magnes, 1984).

29.. See L. Voinot, Pelerinages judeo-musulmans du Maroc (Paris, 1948); H. Zafrani Mille ans de vie juive au Maroc (Paris: Maisonneuve and Larose, 1983), pp. 118-119; I. Ben-Ami (n. 28 above); and A. Meged and H. E. Goldberg, "Rabbi Sa`adia Adati: "The Story of a Saint in the Moroccan Rif," Jerusalem Studies in Jewish Folklore 9, (1986): 89-103.

30.. See the Encyclopaedia Judaica, Jerusalem: Keter, 1971, vol. 8: 495.

31.. Descrptions of musem-s are found in Eickelman, Moroccan Islam, pp. 171-178; Crapanzano, pp. 114-118, and Rabinow, pp. 89-95 (all n. 18 above).

32.. See H. Goldberg, "Potential Polities (n. 24 above). There are obvious differences between the Muslim musem celebrations and Jewish hillulot in that the latter were relatively more subdued and did not include expressions of exuberance such as shooting and horse racing.

33.. Y. Bilu, "Dreams and the Wishes of the Saint," in H. E. Goldberg, ed. (n. 10 above), pp. 83-92.

34.. V. Turner and E. Turner, Image and Pilgrimage in Christian

28

Culture: Anthropological Perspectives (New York: Columbia University Press, 1978).

35.. Some itinerant peddlers and craftsmen might be away from the community on a regular Sabbath, but would always be present on festivals.

36.. M. Bloch and J. Parry, eds. Death and the Regeneration of Life. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), p. 11.

37.. M. Bloch and J. Parry (n. 36 above).

38.. V. Turner and E. Turner (n. 34 above), p. 11.

39.. See, for example, L. C. Briggs and N. Guede, No More For Ever: A Saharan Jewish Town (Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Papers, vol. 55, no. 1, 1964), p. 67; and A. Chouraqui (n. 19 above), p. 280.

40.. H. Zafrani (n. 29 above), p. 101.

41.. See G. Scholem; and D. Matt, ed. (both n. 11 above).

42.. A. Chouraqui (n. 19 above), p. 280, n. 2.

43.. Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Shabbat 33b.

44.. R. Elior, "The Kabbalists of Dra`a," Pe`amim 24 (1985), pp.36-74; and H. Zafrani (n. 29 above), p.198.

45.. In the sixteenth century, Luria and his associates "identified" many ancient sites, in Palestine, including the graves of sages mentioned in the Mishna and Talmud. See the

Encyclopaedia Judaica (n. 30 above).

46.. A biblical verse requires that 50 days be counted from the Passover festival until Pentecost. Ancient tradition has treated this period as a season of semi-mourning. A medieval explanation relates this to the death of Rabbi Akiba's students, as a result of a "plague," during Roman persecutions in the 2nd century. The semi-mourning is suspended on the 33rd day (interpreted as the cessation of the plague), and kabbalistic tradition asserts that this was the day upon which Rabbi Shim`on, who was a disciple of Rabbi Akiva, died. Thus, the 33rd day of the counting (of the `omer) has become the Great hillula (below), in honor of Rabbi

Shim`on.

47.. Other important ones are associated with Rabbi Meir Ba`al Ha-Ness, buried in Tiberias, King David, putatively buried on Mt. Zion, etc.

29

48.. Rabbi Shim`on Labi, of Spanish origin, who was active in Fez and in Tripoli, Libya. He is known for the Bar Yohai hymn, into which his name is woven as an acrostic, and published a major commentary on the Zohar entitled Ketem Paz (Jerusalem: Ahabat Shalom, 1981). See the Encyclopaedia Judaica (n. 30 above) 10: 1318-1319.

49.. See Y. Bilu and H. Abramowitz, "In Search of the Saddiq: Visitational Dreams among Moroccan Jews in Israel," Psychiatry 48

(1985), pp. 83-92 and Y. Bilu, "Dreams and the Wishes of the Saint," (n. 33 above); H. Goldberg, "The Mellahs of Southern Morocco," (n. 25 above).

50.. H. Zafrani, (n. 29 above), pp.58-74; and H. Goldberg, "The Mellahs of Southern Moroccco" (n. 25 above).

51.. A. Chouraqui (n. 17 above), p. 281.

52.. The cabinet in front of the synagogue in which the Torah scrolls were housed, which is often known in English as the "holy ark."

53.. The scarcity of printed books in the rural communities in North Africa is evident in the Judeo-Arabic term for "printed book" common among the Jews of the Tripolitanian countryside in Libya. This term was siddur, whose more general meaning in Jewish culture is a prayer book. Apparently, prayer books were salient among the few printed volumes reaching this region. See Mordechai Hakohen, The Book of Mordekhai (Philadelphia: Institute for the Study of Human Issues, 1980), p. 112. A parallel situation existed in southern Morocco.

54.. H. Goldberg, "Torah and Children," in H. E. Goldberg, ed. (n.

10 above), pp. 116-117. A nineteenth century rabbinical scholar in Tripoli, Libya, has authored a book gathering together the laws and customs pertaining to the ritual handling of a sefer. See A. H. Adadi, Ha-Shomer Emet (Leghorn: Ben Amozag, 1849 [reprinted Tel Aviv: Committe of Libyan Communities in Israel, 1986]).

55.. See the case described in detail in A. L. Udovitch and L. Valensi, The Last Arab Jews: The Communities of Jerba, Tunisia (Chur: Harwood, 1984), pp. 56-57.

56.. Rules pertaining to a sefer stipulate that if a person is transporting a scroll, he should not place it in a sack on a

donkey's back, like merchandise, but should sit on the beast and carry the sefer in his arms. See A. H. Adadi (n. 54 above [1986 ed.]), p. 23.

57.. In Moroccan synagogues in Israel today, one often can see

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several sets of the Zohar located on bookshelves, testifying to gifts which have been made by worshippers.

58.. A parallel practice, known as vakhnakht, existed among European Jewish communities. See U. Weinreich, "Mapping a Culture," Columbia University Forum 6, no. 3 (1963), pp. 17-21, and H. Pollack, Jewish Folkways in Germanic Lands: Studies in Aspects of Daily Life (Cambridge: M.I.T. Press, 1971), pp. 19-20. See, also, the references in A. Stahl (n. 6 above).

59.. An antique hand-written bible that was discovered in a village in Tripolitania at the turn of the nineteenth century, was kept in the home of one of notables of the town of Tripoli. It was wrapped in a manner parallel to a Torah scroll, and was brought into the home of a woman experiencing difficulty in childbirth. S. M. Ha-Cohen, Higgid Mordecai: Histoire de la Libye et de ses Juifs (Jerusalem: Institut Ben-Zvi, 1978), p.266.

60.. It is standard practice that when a man is called to recite the blessings over the reading of the Torah, during public worship, that a prayer be said for his well being on that

occasion. It is also conventional that the man being honored request that a special petition be read for a sick member of the family, or that he offer a special prayer of thanks if he has returned from a long journey.

61.. For example, it is a conventional practice (also based on kabbalistic tradition) that during a memorial service portions of the Mishna are read, as the word mishna is based on the same consonants as the Hebrew word for soul: neshama. See G. Scholem (n. 11 above), p. 285. Typically, portions of the Mishna are selected which form an acrostic of the deceased's name. One may speculate as to whether there is any connection between this

custom and the highly personalized relation to the anthropomorphized Mishna in the mystical experiences of Joseph Karo. See R. J. Z. Werblowsky, Joseph Karo: Lawyer and Mystic (London: Oxford University Press, 1962).

62.. N. Abu-Zahra (n. 18 above).

63.. See, for example, H. A. R. Gibb, Mohammedanism (New York: Oxford University Press, 1962), chap. 8; J. S. Trimingham, Islam in the Sudan (London: Frank Cass, 1965), pp. 128-129; and E. Gellner, Muslim Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), chap. 1, who adds the sociological component of segementary

structures to this argument.

64.. D. Schroeter Merchants of Essaouira: Urban society and imperialism in southwestern Morocco, 1844-1886 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 81. His correlation of the

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night-day contrast with ethnic/religious boundaries builds upon A. Udovitch and L. Valensi (n. 55 above), pp. 63-64.

65.. H. Goldberg, "Torah and Children" (n. 54 above).

66.. A mausoleum standing south of Tiberias is known as the tomb of Rabbi Meir Ba`al ha-Ness (Rabbi Meir, the miracle worker), whose identity is subject to various interpretations. His hillula precedes that of Rabbi Shim`on by four days, and many pilgrims

visit both sites on a single journey.

67.. See the rule in A. H. Adadi (n. 54 above, [1986 ed.]), p. 25.

68.. E. Gellner, Saints (n. 18 above), pp. 104-125.

69.. An oath, as a way of refuting an accusation, is also part of ancient rabbinic law, so that Jewish attitudes toward this institution are not conditioned only by the Muslim environment.

70.. Cf. E. Gellner, Saints (n. 18 above), p. 108.

71.. See A. Chouraqui, (n. 19 above), p. 280, n. 1, who points to an eighteenth century scholar in Algeria as pivotal in this process.

72.. M. Benayahu, Rabbi Hayyim Yoseph David Azulai (Jerusalem: Mosad ha-Rav Kook, 1959).

73.. Cited in A. Stahl, "Ritual" (n. 6 above), p. 84. A somewhat similar stance is expressed by another eighteenth century scholar, M. H. Luzzatto, concerning the chanting of the Zohar, that "Even if one does not understand, the language is suited to the soul." This is cited by D. Matt (n. 11 above), p. 193, n. 3, citing F.

Lachover and I. Tishby, Mishnat Ha-Zohar I (Jerusalem: Mosad Bialik), p. 44.

74.. A precedent to the notion of unclear, but purley motivated reading (even of the Torah), being pleasing to God is found in the Midrash Rabbah to the Song of Songs, verse 2:4. It is not given any formal recognition, however, in normative synagogue practice.

75.. See, for example, the Sabbath and Festival Prayer Book (New York: The Rabbinical Assembly of America and the United Synagogue of America), pp. 117-118.

76.. W. Christian, Jr., Local Religion in Sixteenth Century Spain (Princeton: Princeton University Press).

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