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Ottoman Jewry
Leadership, Charity, and Literacy
Series: - Christians and Jews in Muslim Societies, Volume: 12
Author:
This book is a history of Ottoman Jews that challenges prevailing assumptions about Jews’ arrival in the empire, their relations with Muslims, and the role of religious and lay leaders. The book argues that rabbis played a less prominent role as communal and spiritual leaders than we have thought; and that the religious community was one of several frameworks within which Ottoman Jews operated. A focus on charitable and educational communal practices shows that with time Jews preferred to avoid the scrutiny of rabbis and the community, leading to private initiatives that undermined rabbinical and lay authority.
Yaron Ayalon, Ph.D. (2009), Princeton University, is Associate Professor at the College of Charleston. He has written many articles on Jewish and Ottoman history, and a monograph,
Natural Disasters in the Ottoman Empire: Plague, Famine, and Other Misfortunes (Cambridge, 2014)
Preface
List of Figures and Tables
Abbreviations
Introduction
1 Who Were Ottoman Jews?
2 Ottoman Jewish History: the State of the Field
3 What This Book Does Not Do
4 Book Structure
1 Ottoman Jewry, Origins and Growth
1 One Overplayed Letter
2 The Sephardim Arrive
3 The Textile Industry and the Decline of Safed
4 Ottoman Jews and the Environment
2 Ottoman Jewry, Opportunities and Crises
1 Demography and Economy
2 The Environment, Again: Jewish Settlement Patterns and the Little Ice Age
3 Izmir and Aleppo
4 Hardships and Prophecy
5 Expanding Opportunities in the Eighteenth Century
3 Communal Leadership, Rabbis, and Others
1 Rabbis in the Existing Scholarship
2 Jews in Ottoman Society
3 The Frankos Affair
4 Toward a Model of Communal Leadership
4 Poor Relief and Communal Authority
1 Foundations of Jewish Charity
2 Public Charity
3 Semi-public Charity
4 Private Charity
5 Why Give?
6 Charitable Societies and the Weakening of Communal Authority
5 Education, Reading, and Rabbinical Authority
1 Education
2 Intellectual Circles
3 The Inner Circle and Its Library
4 The Value of Books
5 The End of Knowledge Monopoly
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index
List of Figures and Tables
Abbreviations
Introduction
1 Who Were Ottoman Jews?
2 Ottoman Jewish History: the State of the Field
3 What This Book Does Not Do
4 Book Structure
1 Ottoman Jewry, Origins and Growth
1 One Overplayed Letter
2 The Sephardim Arrive
3 The Textile Industry and the Decline of Safed
4 Ottoman Jews and the Environment
2 Ottoman Jewry, Opportunities and Crises
1 Demography and Economy
2 The Environment, Again: Jewish Settlement Patterns and the Little Ice Age
3 Izmir and Aleppo
4 Hardships and Prophecy
5 Expanding Opportunities in the Eighteenth Century
3 Communal Leadership, Rabbis, and Others
1 Rabbis in the Existing Scholarship
2 Jews in Ottoman Society
3 The Frankos Affair
4 Toward a Model of Communal Leadership
4 Poor Relief and Communal Authority
1 Foundations of Jewish Charity
2 Public Charity
3 Semi-public Charity
4 Private Charity
5 Why Give?
6 Charitable Societies and the Weakening of Communal Authority
5 Education, Reading, and Rabbinical Authority
1 Education
2 Intellectual Circles
3 The Inner Circle and Its Library
4 The Value of Books
5 The End of Knowledge Monopoly
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index
Scholars, students, and some general readers working in the areas of or interested in Jewish, Sephardic, and Ottoman history.