Morocco: NEH grant to help digitize Rabat Geniza Documents

One among thousands of documents Kosansky sifted through. These documents were written in Judeo-Arabic, an Arab dialect written in Hebrew script . Photo: Lewis & Clark

Morocco: NEH grant to help digitize Rabat Geniza Documents

A Lewis & Clark anthropologist has recieved a grant to digitize documents found in a Rabat Geniza. According to the Lewis & Clarke College website:

What began with simple curiosity about a small room filled with bags of papers in a synagogue in Rabat, Morocco, has become a project that will help change the way anthropologists and historians document cultures around the world.

Oren Kosansky, assistant professor of anthropology, has earned a $50,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to develop a digital archive of Judaic Moroccan documents from the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. The online archive will open access to researchers with an interest in Jewish culture in Northern Africa and allow them to share ideas and information widely. Of even greater interest to the NEH, the project will offer a new model for intercultural and international collaboration in the creation of technological resources to share historical information.

Making a discovery

Kosansky’s fascination with Judiaism in Morocco dates back to his graduate work in the early 1990s. In 2005, a Fulbright research grant took him to Rabat, the capital of Morocco and former home to a large Jewish community. During his stay, Kosansky worked closely with leaders of Rabat’s major synagogue and community center. It was there that he discovered a genizah—a room or depository found in synagogues, where old religious documents that are no longer in use are kept and periodically buried.

“In Judaic tradition, documents containing references to God are forbidden from being destroyed,” Kosansky explained. “Most obviously books and papers on religious topics such as the Torah are deemed sacred and treated in a ceremonious fashion, but any item with religious or legal references—such as a wedding announcement or business contract—would also be kept.

“In this case, I found literally thousands of books and documents pertaining to virtually all facets of Jewish life in Morocco, especially as it was transformed during the 20th century. My first thought was, ‘How can I save these materials from burial, so that they can be consulted by community members and scholars.’”

Kosansky noted that the Jewish community in Rabat once numbered in the thousands and had dwindled to fewer than 100, following a broader trend of emigration that brought the majority of Moroccan Jews to Israel, France, and other global destinations. As an anthropologist, he saw great potential for research materials that could serve many in his field.

“Written materials are very important in Judaism,” Kosansky explained. “It is a very textual culture. These documents offer great insight into a culture and a community of people that once thrived here. They offer an opportunity to investigate elements of a society that has not been fully explored by those of us in the academic field. For the Jewish community, it represents something perhaps even more valuable—an opportunity to reflect on how their traditions have been shaped by modern life, colonialism, technological change, and global networks of migration, communication, and commerce.”

With the approval of community leaders, Kosansky sorted through hundreds of sacks containing thousands of documents and determined which documents were appropriate for burial and which represented significant historical texts suitable for preservation. Synagogue leaders gave Kosansky the documents for preservation, and he donated them to the Jewish Museum in Casablanca.

The unparalleled collection contains many unique documents, including handwritten letters, unpublished manuscripts, and community records, as well as published materials in a variety of languages, including Judeo-Arabic, Hebrew, and French. The documents now held by the museum will be the focus of Kosansky’s NEH digitization project.

Read the entire article here.

Germany: University of Potsdam and Jewish Museum Berlin Collaborate on Memmelsdorf Genizah

Germany: University of Potsdam and Jewish Museum Berlin Collaborate on Memmelsdorf Genizah
by Samuel D. Gruber

(ISJM) On July 22, 2009 Jan Kixmüller reported in the Potsdamer Neueste Nachrichten that the University of Potsdam is partnering with the Jewish Museum Berlin to further identify, investigate, transcribe and translate various items discovered in a geniza in Memmelsdorf (a Franconian town in Southern Germany) in February 2002. The Genizah was discovered during the renovation of an old half-timbered building, when a ceiling fan was removed, and a linen bag containing a variety of Judaica fell from the ceiling. In the bag were fragments of Jewish prayer book, a community order, letters, a calendar, lottery tickets and business cards. Investigation of the space in the ceiling revealed other items – not all typical of a Genizah - including childrens' shoes, tobacco and prayer belt pouch. Though many genizot from synagogues have been found, including one in the (conserved and open to the public in 2004) former synagogue of Memmelsdorf discovered in 1979, such finds from private houses are rare (I can’t recall any). Researchers have determined that the house in Memmelsdorf had been owned by Jews from 1775 until 1939. The fate of final Jewish owners is unknown. The Geniza materials date from 1770 to 1830.

Now, Jewish Studies students at Potsdam University’s Wintersemester are selecting items from the Genizah for research and exhibition. This the first cooperative project between the University and the Museum. The full significance of the collection, which was purchased by the Jewish Museum Berlin in 2003, remains to be researched.

Material from the Memmelsdorf synagogue genizah comprised about 20 percent of the items shown in an exhibition created the Hidden Legacy Foundation of London, in the mid-1990s, that traveled to many German and European cities, Jerusalem and the United States. Much of the material form that genizah has been conserved and is stored in the Jewish Documentation Center in Wuerzburg. The catalog of the Hidden Legacy edited by Falk Wiesemann remains an excellent introduction to the subject and materials of south German genizot. See: Genizah - Hidden Legacies of the German Village Jews / Genisa - Verborgenes Erbe der Deutschen Landjuden (Vienna: Hidden Legacy Foundation, 1992. ISBN 3-570-10501-6)

The 1990s was a period of renewed interest in rural German Jewish culture. Hundreds of forgotten former synagogues - many reused as homes, garages, workshops, and firehouses - were identified. Researchers were on the lookout for genizah materials. Some of these were literally rescued from dumpsters where they had been tossed during local construction work, as this was also a period of renovation of older buildings by a new and more prosperous generation. In addition to materials from Memmelsdorf, much material was found in the former synagogue of Veitschocheim near Wurzburg and has been studied and conserved and is on view in a permanent exhibition next to the restored synagogue in that small town.

Genizot materials as especially valuable to historians for several reasons. They usually contain otherwise unknown printed works - often ephemeral but once popular items including religious and secular texts. Genizot also often contain original unique documentary material often of a personal nature, including receipts and contracts. In Germany they shed light on many aspects of everyday life for Jews in small towns and villages, and they also include material valuable in the interpretation of local Hebrew and Yiddish language usage.

The Potsdamer Institute of Jewish Studies Potsdamer is one of the largest (perhaps the largest) such program in Germany, with more 300 enrolled students. The Berlin Jewish Museum is the most visited Jewish Museum in Europe. The collaboration between Potsdam and Berlin in intended to benefit both institutions, and to help shape the next generation of German Jewish museum scholars and professionals.