Encyclopedia of Islam

Sephardic Jews

  

611  J

---

the expulsion in 1492, three categories of Jews 

had emerged: conversos (Sp., “converts”), mar-

ranos (Sp., derogatory term for crypto-Jews, who 

converted while maintaining Jewish practices in 

secret), and those who refused to convert. Some 

emigrants established Portuguese-speaking com-

munities in Western Europe, while most resettled 

in the Ottoman Empire, where they continued to 

speak Arabic and Ladino.

The Ottoman 

sUltan

 welcomed this mass 

immigration of talented Sephardic Jews, whose 

connections to Europe and allegiance to the Otto-

mans made them exceptional diplomats, transla-

tors, and purveyors of European medicine and 

military technology. Sephardic communities, such 

as those of Salonika and Istanbul, were famous 

for their printing presses and academies. Their 

magnificent yeshivas and synagogues are distinct 

from Ashkenazic buildings, and in fact the syna-

gogue service and unique rituals also reflect local 

customs and Islamic influences.

The decline of Ottoman Jewry accompanied the 

decline of the empire itself. The t

anzimat

 reforms 

of 1839 attempted to curtail foreign intervention by 

bringing minorities under the control of the cen-

tral government. However, the Damascus Affair of 

1840, in which the Syrian Jewish community was 

charged with a blood libel, provoked international 

Jewish defense efforts and increased demands by 

Britain and France for Ottoman reforms. This 

international solidarity was the catalyst for the Alli-

ance Israélite Universelle, begun in 1860 by liberal 

French Jews. This program introduced Eastern 

Jews to Western ideas and values in an attempt to 

achieve full citizenship for the Jews of the Ottoman 

Empire. The Sephardic community split between 

supporting the alliance and adopting the Zion-

ist position that emancipation was possible only 

within a Jewish state.

After the victors of World War I split apart the 

former Ottoman Empire, the majority populations 

persecuted the Sephardic ethnic and religious 

minorities. World War II decimated the Sephardic 

community. Those few who survived emigrated 

primarily to i

srael

, France, and North America 

in the following years. Each community shows 

evidence of maintaining a distinct Sephardic cul-

tural and religious identity while at the same time 

assimilating into the broader community.

See also a

ndalUsia

; a

lmohad

 

dynasty

; i

stanbUl

; 

J

Udaism

 

and

 i

slam

; o

ttoman

 

dynasty

; 

reFUgees

.

Jessica Andruss