Dr Hilary Pomeroy
The Jews of Muslim Spain: A Golden Age? Part 2

Dr Hilary Pomeroy - The Jews of Spain: A ‘Golden Age’? - An Historical and Cultural Overview, Part 2

- Whilst we have little documentary evidence about the life of the Jews of Muslim Spain that is Al-Andalus in its early centuries, that’s the 8th and 9th centuries, from 10th century onwards, however, material is available. Much of that material is in the form of poetry. By that time, that is the 10th century, Jews had moved away from the countryside and from agriculture because of the high taxes involved and moved to the town so we have the urbanisation of Jews and also the Arabization so there was a social and cultural transformation under Islam. So from working in agriculture, Jews became artisans and traders, and if they were members of the elite, they could then become members of the court. I’d like to quote from Scheindlin this, his summary of the Jews of Muslim Spain. “No other Jewish community produced "as many Jews who acquired positions of status "and power in the non-Jewish world; "and no other Jewish community produced "such an extensive literary culture "reflecting the deep impact "of an intellectual life shared with non-Jews.” So very much a stress of symbiosis and sharing. Well, what did they share? Well, certainly, they shared a language. The Jews used Arabic as the classical language of culture, administration for scientific and intellectual production. And also for culture, they used it for poetry. And they used a more colloquial form of Arabic for the family and the home. Now, how did that differ from Jewish language use? Well, Jews did use classical Arabic. They needed to use classical Arabic for interaction with the Muslim community.

And Arabic was certainly, the language of learning and of administration as we learn about Shmuel ha-Nagid who advanced in the world partly because of his ability to manipulate and use Arabic. He went deeply into the principles of the Arabic language and was familiar with the works of the most subtle grammarians. He spoke and wrote classical Arabic with the greatest ease using this language in the letters which he wrote on behalf of his king. In brief, one would believe that his letters were written by a pious Muslim, the greatest compliment to imagine that Shmuel ha-Nagid, the head of the Jewish community, could have been a pious Muslim. And Judeo-Arabic, however, was used for writing scientific work such as medicine or grammar. And it was the everyday spoken language. I’m showing you a picture of the Alhambra to show what court life was like or could be like in Muslim Spain. And the court life was reproduced over and over again, over the next two centuries, there would be Jewish courts and Jewish courtiers. So let’s begin to look at the Golden Age of Hebrew poetry, its revival and its efflorescence. Well, we should bear in mind that the Hebrew of the golden period, or the Hebrew poetry had two main uses: one was liturgical for prayer and one was the opposite, it was secular. And at the bottom we have an example of some of the tiles that decorated not only the Alhambra but also would decorate these synagogues of Muslim Spain. Now, who were the poets of the Golden Age of Muslim Spain? And the Golden Age was roughly mid 10th century to mid 12th century. Well, perhaps the main ones were Shmuel ha-Nagid, Shlomo ibn Gabirol, Moses ibn Ezra and Yehuda Halevi. But poetry didn’t die out with the end of Muslim Spain.

When Jews moved to Christian Spain, the Jews continued to write beautiful poetry in Hebrew. So to quote from Ross Brann, the scholar Ross Bran, “Jews were accorded economic opportunity, religious freedom, "social integration in the defined role "of ‘protected people,’ and they were also caught up "in the intellectual stimulation "and challenges of the Islamic civilization.” So the Golden Age of Hebrew poetry lasted from the reign of the Caliph Abd al-Rahman III, until the invasion in the 11th and 12th centuries of two consecutive, fanatical Berber tribes. They were the Almoravids and the Almohads. It should be noted that both Hebrew and Arabic stemmed from the study of the sacred text. So for Arabs or for Muslims, study of the Koran was the highest form of study and of literary achievement. Just as the Jews, the Bible was the most important text. Of poetry was greatly appreciated and esteemed by Arabs as also was a subtle use of language. So let’s look at some of the Islamic cultural heritage, much of which we looked at last week. The architecture, furnishings, furnishings material culture there, curtains, cushions in beautiful materials, urban planning, calligraphy illuminated manuscripts, music, cuisine and poetry. So elements such as music and cuisine from Muslim Spain have lived on ‘til today. Certainly in Morocco, the music, court music up 'til this century was that of the Jewish musicians from Al-Andalus who then, went to Morocco. And the cuisine, the wonderful Sephardic cuisine is based very much on plants, vegetables, fruit, and herbs and spices that were introduced by the Arabs when they invaded Morocco from 711 onwards. Let me remind you that at that invasion, the leaders were Arabs, but the main army consisted of Berbers from Morocco who had, for the most part, only recently converted to Islam. And the Berbers normally were herdsmen, they weren’t the cultured, cultivated elite and would come to complain very much about the Arab superiors.

The elite Arabs lived in the wonderful cities of the south and basically the Berbers were relegated to the north and looked after the land. And then of course, that very important part of the cultural heritage, which we will be looking at in greater detail now, and that is poetry. So once again, Spanish Jews adapted and adopted, not only the languages of the Muslims, but also the habits of the Muslim court. They became members of the main court and they also had their own small courts. So we get what became known as courtier rabbis. And many of the courtier rabbis would never or would never have been near a Muslim court. But there were various, if you like, satellite courts. Hebrew poetry is the poetry of the Jewish elites. The elites were the diplomats, the courtiers, and also those courtier rabbis. Many poets also wrote liturgical poems for the synagogue as well as for daily enjoyment. But much more important was the new style of secular poetry, which had been adapted and adopted from the Muslim system. These were poems that celebrated the pleasures of life, wine, love, nature, gardens. And of course, liturgical poems were, however, more important than secular ones in the sense that they were used in the synagogue. Whereas the new secular poetry was produced only for the elite. So liturgical poetry, religious poetry was for everyone, the entire Jewish community. Secular poetry for the elite. The traditional, wonderful traditional imagery of Arabic poetry was taken over by Jewish purities. And they adopted those similes and metaphors and they’re wonderful, and we’ll have a look at some of them presently. But I stress once again, the revival of Hebrew was for literary use outside of the religious sphere.

And Hebrew obtained a new intensity. What were the motifs of Arabic poetry? Well, many of the themes were ones such as the abandoned encampment. And remember that during these centuries there was not continuous peace in Muslim Spain, there would’ve been fighting or strife between different Muslim tribes. And then, you also have the beginning of the reconquest of Spain. So it wasn’t always peaceful. And abandoned encampments would’ve been familiar scenes. Poetry was written to praise one’s self. They wrote about the lush beautiful gardens, which were so loved by the Arabs, who had come from Syria, from the arid lands of Syria and introduced irrigation and made Andalusia fertile and green that introduced a green revolution. The other subjects include the singing of birds, the music that accompanied banquets, friendship, the awakening from a dream or from a drunken stupor. And of course, a huge body of love poetry, which includes homosexual love, which is often found very shocking because these themes about homosexual love were often written by rabbis or religious persons. But we don’t know whether the poet was following a convention that you write about that sort of love or if this was true but in the poetry, the loved one, the male loved one would be referred to as a gazelle or a fawn, and the woman as a doe. Amongst the themes also, we have the fragility of life, the abandoned camp, which we’ve already mentioned, war, this continuous war and also, eulogies. Praise, praise of the patron, of the Maecenas of the person who financed the poetry in many cases. And then there’s the theme of trouble. And we should remember that at this period in the early Middle Ages, people travelled enormously across the Mediterranean from Spain to the Middle East. And Jews had the freedom to travel, which was not always the case in Christian Spain but certainly, under Islam they were very often free to travel.

But of course, travel then leads us to exile and loneliness. And amongst other poems there were panegyrics, praise. Now, what are the actual features of the Hebrew poems? If you looked at them, how could you perhaps realise that this was a poem from Islamic Spain? We tend to think that all poems have titles, but this wasn’t the case in the Middle Ages or right up, in many cases, to the 20th century, they would have no title, poems would not have a title. My particular feel of specialist research is Judeo-Spanish ballads, they’re narrative poems. And I was always used to reading these poems and they would have a title. But when I went to Sephardic communities in Turkey, Greece and Morocco, if I said, please sing for me “The Ballad of the Abandoned Wife,” or “The Return of the Husband,” then that title meant nothing whatsoever. So we must assume that to identify the particular songs or poems, one would always refer to the content. Hebrew poetry has monorhyme that is to say there is one rhyme all the way through the poem, there is no variation. Very often there is the use of dialogue which makes it very vivid. And if there isn’t dialogue very often, the poem is narrated in the first person. It becomes very personal, very intense. And there is also a feature that we would not necessarily recognise ourselves, but to the learned Jews of the 10th to 12th century this was the use of insetting.

That’s the use of quotations from the Bible, particularly from Psalms and from the Song of Psalms, which would be acknowledged and appreciated. The poetry was extremely sensual and perhaps, in many cases, surprisingly erotic. Now the Arab poets, as well as the Hebrew poets had used very vivid, very striking images and metaphors. Three of these similes are from Arab poetry, three from Hebrew, the first three are from Arab poetry. So when talking about the aubergine, an aubergine looks like a red lamb’s heart held in the talons of a vulture. And I find that very, very visual indeed. Or to describe soldiers who are assembling in a group and wearing their shields on their back, they are compared to turtles, a crowd of turtles at a pond. And then a particularly beautiful image when describing the lights of boats as they go along the river possibly along the Guadiloba River as it goes through Seville. These are likened to the jewels, to the necklace on a beautiful woman’s neck. And in Hebrew poetry we have this very powerful reference, “Heart’s grief like sharp arrows… "through me like never before,” very true and vivid. “The night put on a black chain mail… "Thunder pierced it with a lightning lance.” And more picturesque, “The hills have put on "turbans of blossoms… The plains "its robes of grasses and herbs.” So you can see how beautiful and attractive, and sensual this poetry was. Now, what was the aim of Hebrew poetry? Very similar of course, to Arabic poetry it was to praise public figures. It was also to mourn. It was used to persuade and could be used as a political tools to influence, to commemorate important events.

To event, which is the one which we often remember most. Sorry about the repetition here, and to celebrate victory. So many poems were written to praise patrons, Maecenas, politicians and scholars, and poets such as Shlomo ibn Gabirol could not have survived without the financial support of the patron or the people for whom he worked. Now there is a great paradox, as you will notice, in the poems, these Hebrew poems is that there seems to be a combination of opposing sentiments. You have yearning for the spiritual homeland, for Israel, devotion to the holy land, but you also get de-seated attachment to Al-Andalus. Moses ibn Ezra, when he went into exile in the north in Christian Spain, he went into exile from Berber Al-Andalus because the Almoravides and Almohads insisted that the Jews convert to Islam. He left to go to wander in Christian Spain in the north. And he longed for his home in Granada. He said, “I am here with them today. "I’m here in Granada, a gentleman among savages "amongst the flock of apes and parrots.” Now the first known Hebrew poem, it’s a very delightful one, is a reply to an invitation to a feast. Or that’s the title that it has been given, although it would not have had a title at the time. It’s actually a poem. It’s about wine and vintage, which we would probably find it surprising and shocking so let’s read the first half. This is dialogue, “He said: 'Do not sleep. ”'Drink vintage wine while henna and lily, “'myrrh and aloes, pomegranates, tamarisks and grapes, ”'and pleasant and anemones fill the garden rows. “'The singers are accompanied by cithern and viol, ”'the ripple of the fountains, the murmur of the lute. “'All the little birds sing among the leaves, ”'in the tall trees whose boughs are filled with fruit.’“ And this is when we get the great change because whilst Arabic poetry had its emphasis on the form, on the structure, Hebrew poetry, obviously, polished the form, but the emphasis is on the content.

So we get a change in tone now, in the second half of the poem. This would’ve been the setting, that lovely setting in which the poem, we imagine this poem being sung as here. "I rebuked him: Silence! "How can you talk so, "When the Temple, God’s footstool, "Is in the enemy’s power? "Your words are foolish. "You prefer to be idle. "Your thoughts are worthless. "You scorn the divine… "You no longer think on the law of God. "You can be happy. "And there are foxes in Zion. "How can we drink? "How raise our eyes? "When we are as nothing, "A race all despise.” So you see the great and, very effective contrast there. Amongst the wonderful poets I must of course, give much attention to Shmuel HaNagid, who was an exceptional person. Last week, I emphasised, how according to the Pact of Omar, Jews were having freedom to practise their religion, able, as I said, to travel, however, remained secondary citizens. They weren’t first class citizens. They could not be in situations above Muslims. However, a great exception was the towering figure of Shmuel HaNagid and, in fact, he wasn’t shy to praise himself. He called himself the David of his age because he was both a poet and a warrior.

And here are two of his short poems. “Luxuries ease, but when trouble comes "People are plagued for the wealth they’ve accrued. "The peacock’s tail is spectacular- "but it weighs him down on the day he’s pursued.” Very pungent, very to the point and truthful. And of course, this wonderful image, this four line stanza about war. “War at first is like a young girl "With whom every man desires to flirt. "And at the last it is an old woman, "All who meet her feel grieved and hurt.” So Shmuel HaNagid was a poet, a rabbi, a diplomat. And strangely and exceptionally, he was put in charge of the Muslim army, and wrote several poems about his experiences. And you can feel when you hear and read the poems that these are very much his own experiences. They’re not being recounted, in other words, he was embedded in the army, in the forces just as troubadours would’ve been during all this time. And let’s look at one of his poems, which we refer to as “The Citadel,” having given it a name. “I stationed a strong force in a citadel "Which soldiers had destroyed long ago. "We slept there, in it, and around it, "And its owners slept beneath us, down below. "I said to myself: ‘Where are the people, "Those who lived here in years that have gone? "Where are the builders and destroyers and slaves, "And the masters, the princes and the woebegones?’” So as very much in Hebrew poetry, we’re thinking about the content, even Gabirol is thinking about the people who had lived once in the citadel and who are buried beneath it. “Where are the parents, the bereaved, the fathers, "The sons, the bridegrooms, and the mourners, "And the large numbers that were born after these, "As the seasons turned through the cycle of the years? "They were all neighbours on the face of the earth, "And now they lie together in the earth’s womb.

"They moved to the dust from their pleasant courts.” So we have this great contrast of what they had been and to what they are now, lying in the dust. “And from the palaces to the tomb. "Were they to raise their heads and emerge, "They would despoil us, of our lives and possessions. "In truth, my soul, in truth, by tomorrow, "I shall be like them, and all my companions.” So Shmuel HaNagid, the vizier, the leader of the army and all his army, they too, before long, will be dead. One of the fiercest battles by Shmuel HaNagid was known as the Battle of Alfuente. And again, look at these images that are so powerful and, I would say, can only have come from someone who actually experienced the conditions that were present, rather than imagining them. “The day was a day of dust cloud and darkness; "The sun was as black as my heart;” So you can almost feel the fear and the despair at the first. “The clamour of the troups,” the hooves, the sound of the horseshoes, “Was like thunder, like the sea "And its waves when it rages in a storm… "The horses were running back "and forth darting from the den. "And the lances as they were cast "Were lightning that filled the air with a gleam.” And now really potent as an image. “The arrows were like drops of rain, "And the bows in their hands were like snakes, "And each snake was spitting out a bee.” So you can imagine this mass of arrows flying through the air and how terrifying they must have been.

“The swords over our heads were like torches, "But falling they put out the light.” Now, Shmuel HaNagid’s son Joseph became the leader of the Jewish community. And there was a very powerful letter written complaining about the way the Jews of Granada had risen to positions of power. So I want to read this poem, Muslim poem of complaint referring, I think, to both Shmuel HaNagid and later, his son. “…He has chosen an infidel as his secretary "when he could, had he wished, chosen a Believer. "Through him, the Jews have become great and proud… "They collect all the revenues, they munch and they crunch. "They dress in the finest clothes "while you wear the meanest…” Now throughout the centuries, there have always been complaints about Jews either dressing like Muslims or wearing materials and jewels, which they should not have done. And this continues in 1391 in Christian Spain. There were pogroms against the Jews. And basically, a third of the Jewish population was killed and a third converted, and the remaining third stayed as Jews. And some years later, various or regulations were produced, which stress that Jews should not wear the finest clothes and should not wear jewels in public, and copy Gentiles and non-Jews. So Abu Ishaq goes on to say, “Do not consider it a breach of faith to kill them - "the breach of faith would be to let them carry on. "They have violated our covenant.” That’s the Covenant of Umar, the Pact of Omar, or Omar or Umar, which I referred to last week. “So how can you be held guilty against violators? "How can they have any pact "When we are obscure and they are prominent?…” And now we come to the section of the poem where we remember the communities that had been destroyed during this period. This is the wonderful, very powerful lament for Andalusian Jewry. Abraham ibn Ezra spent most of his life out of Muslim Spain in Christian Spain. He was a polymath, he could do everything. He is very well known for a treatise of mathematics and spent some time in England.

And he wrote this extraordinary, very moving poem, lamenting the fate of the Jews of Al-Andalus under the Almoravids, these fanatical, puritanical, fierce dynasty from Morocco. “I moan like an owl for the town of Lucena… Why Lucena? Well, Jeffrey reminded us last week of Lucena, this town oft known for its very large Jewish population, which is why it’s particularly being referred to here, and it’s yeshiva. "I shave my head,” shaving one’s head was a sign of mourning, a very powerful sign. “I shave my head and bitterly keen "For Seville’s martyrs and sons who were taken, "As daughters were forced into strangeness of faith.” So, the women were forced to convert to Islam. That wonderful city, Cordoba. “Cordoba’s ruined like the desolate sea: "Its nobles and sages have perished in hunger. "There are no Jews left in Jaen, "Majorca, Malaga and Almeria. "All traces of life are gone - "For those who survived were beaten down, "For this I wail my grief and mourn - "For they have melted away like water.” So the Jewish community has disappeared just as water disappears. And then Ibn Ezra goes on to lament the communities in Morocco “For Sijilmassa,” Sijilmassa was a town on the trade routes from the Sahara and it had a large Jewish population.

“For Sijilmassa I groan in distress - "A city of sages whose lights barred darkness - "Its pillar of Talmud was toppled and broken; "Its Mishna was trampled, cursed and crushed. "The upright was slaughtered, and no one was spared. "Fez was razed and its brethren butchered. Fez where Maimonides took refuge and possibly, converted to Islam. "Tlemcen’s splendour shines no more. "For Meknes and Ceuta my cry is bitter. "For Der'a I put on sackcloth and mourn. "Their blood, on the Sabbath, was spilled like water.” In fact, like other poets, Ibn Ezra could write on a variety of subjects. So I’m going to quote now, from this very heavy, distressing poem two light ones. One is called “The Old Cloak.” And I think with our moth infestations that we have here in London, you can understand what is being said here. “I have a cloak that is like a sieve "to sift wheat or barley. "I spread it out like a tent in the dark of night "And the stars shine through it,” just as some of my garments do now. “Through it I see the play outs "And Orion flashing his light. "I am tired of counting all its holes "Which are shaped like the tee of a saw. "No thread can hope to mend its gaps "and warp and move too many holes. "If a fly landed on it with its full weight, "It would quickly regret its foolishness. "Oh God, give me a robe of glory in exchange. "This would be properly tailored.” And then I mentioned the importance of patrons, Maecenas for paying for the upkeep and supporting individual patrons. And we have this amusing poem now from Ibn Ezra about his patron. “When I come to the patron’s house early in the morning, "They say, ‘He has already ridden away.’

"When I come in the evening, "They say, ‘He has already gone to sleep.’ "He either climbs into his carriage "Or climbs into his bed. "Woe to the born to misfortune.” Now I can’t conclude without looking at the poetry of wonderful Yehuda Halevi, philosopher, poet, rabbi, scholar, who was yet besides being this scholar, was able to write on frivolous subjects just as was typical of the Hebrew poets who might sympathise with this poem. “When a lone silver hair appeared on my head "I plucked it out with my hand, and it said: ”‘You’ve beaten me one on one - “But what will you do with the army to come?” Yehuda ibn Ezra when was well mature, began to long, as typical of so many Jews, for the homeland, for the East. He couldn’t adapt to life in Muslim and Christian Spain. And here is perhaps, his most famous poem, which is a series of oppositions, contrast, which is why it is so effective. “My heart is in the East - and I am at the edge of the West” So my heart is in Israel, but I am at the West. And of course, Muslim Spain was the furthest west of the Islamic Empire. “How can I possibly taste what I eat? "How could it please me? "How can I keep my promise or even fulfil my vow, "When Zion is held by Edom,” so Israel, at this, time was in the hand of the Edom being the Christians, the Crusaders. “And I am bound by Arabia’s chains. "I’d gladly leave behind me all the pleasures of Spain - "If only I might see the dust and ruins of your Shrine.” So I would encourage you, having glimpsed some fragments of Hebrew poetry, to study some of the wonderful books that have been written.

And Yehuda Halevi is someone one should look at in great detail, Shmuel ha-Nagid, and a book, if you are looking for a book of poems in translation, the one I would really highly recommend is “The Dream of the Poem,” by Peter Cole. If you have had the opportunity to hear Peter Cole reading his translations, it’s as if he’s speaking poetry that he is composing as he reads them. But the problem is that when we look at these Hebrew poems, first of all, there’s always a problem when we look at poems in translation. And then there is a further problem in that, few of us are scholars of the Hebrew works such as the Talmud, the Bible, the Song of Songs. So we don’t recognise the references, the biblical references that are embedded, that are set in within the poem. But a mark of the resilience and the power of the poems is that even without understanding any reference, or Hebrew references, we are touched and overcome by the power of these poems, thank you. I’ve been asked if I could read several lines of any Hebrew poem, I can’t, I’m not a Hebrew scholar. I’m Hispanist, I work on Spanish.

Q&A and Comments:

Margaret has commented on really saying how Hebrew is such a rich language. I mean, we miss so much because we aren’t able to look at the original Hebrew. On the other hand, I would say that we get a tremendous amount from these wonderful translations. I mentioned once again, “The Dream of the Poem.”

I think in answer to the question, is it possible to have a recording of Part 1? Yes, there are recordings available. You’d have to get in touch with them should you find them.

“The Dream of the Poem” then, by Peter Cole, a wonderful book but also, there is another book which I like very much “Hebrew Poems from Spain,” edited and translated by David Goldstein. And I think that is all… Are there any more questions?

• [Moderator] Well, thank you so much for joining us and we hope to have you back.

• [Hilary] Thank you.