Muslim Society as an

Alternative: Jews
Converting to Islam

Bat-Zion Eraqi Klorman

A BSTR ACT
The article discusses the phenomenon of Jewish conversion to Islam in Yemen in the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries, mainly in the tribal-rural areas where the major-
ity of the Jews lived. This phenomenon is explained against the background of politi-
cal, social, and economic developments: the intervention in Yemen of outside forces;
the penetration of the world economy; and the weakening of Jewish institutions. Reli-
gious conversion is presented as a familiar and tempting phenomenon in Jewish life.
Social considerations are put forward as the main reasons for Islamization, whereas
the role of religious conviction is seen as insignificant. The article also deals with the
symbolic meanings of the conversion ceremony and with its practical implications—in
the convert’s community of origin and in his or her new community. This article is
based on oral history, on personal interviews with Yemeni Jews now living in Israel,
and on written sources such as letters, memoirs, itinerary books, and legal writings on
issues resulting from conversion.
Key words: Conversion, Islamization, Yemeni Jews, tribal

T
he phenomenon of religious conversion continues to exist and
to intrigue even after the age of conversions that stabilized the
religious map of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. What causes
a person or a group to abandon their faith, their traditions, and their
community affiliations and to adopt new sets of beliefs and a new social
structure? What is the role of religious convictions, and what is the ef-
fect of social considerations and pressures? Although processes of con-
version differ as a result of political, social, and economic factors,

Bat-Zion Eraqi Klorman, “Muslim Society as an Alternative: Jews Converting

to Islam,” Jewish Social Studies: History, Culture, Society n.s. 14, no. 1 (Fall 2007):
89–118
 specific time, and locality, they also resemble each other. In this article,
I will discuss the phenomenon of conversion in the Jewish community
[90] of Yemen (North Yemen, before unification with South Yemen in 1990)
and its uniqueness, focusing on the period from the nineteenth cen-
Jewish tury until the middle of the twentieth century (at which time most Ye-
Social meni Jews left Yemen and immigrated to Israel).
Studies In Yemen, religious conversion ran largely in one direction: from
• Judaism to Islam. The conversion of a Muslim was unimaginable, not
Vol. 14 only because of its social and political disadvantages but mainly be-
No. 1 cause it was forbidden by the shari‘a, which remained the legal foun-
dation of the state until the middle of the twentieth century. (The
shari‘a calls for the death penalty for any murtad, or Muslim convert.)1
In contrast, Jewish law regards a Jew who converts to another religion
as a Jew who has gone astray but who may return to the right path.
This article’s methodology is based on data that, for the most part,
have not yet been analyzed. It relies on oral history—personal inter-
views with Yemeni Jews now living in Israel—and on written sources
such as letters, archival documents, memoirs of Jews who emigrated
from Yemen during the twentieth century, itinerary books, and legal
writings concerning issues (mainly in family law) resulting from con-
version. In general, Yemeni Jewish writings discuss the forced conver-
sion of Jewish orphans explicitly2 but are reluctant to mention
voluntary conversions.3 Thus, rabbinic figures who wrote an “official
narrative” of Jewish life in Yemen report almost exclusively on Islam-
ization in times of crisis or on the dramatic conversion of a distin-
guished personality.4 Writers of memoirs usually describe the converts
as being tempted by Muslims, 5 and Yemeni Jewish scholarly historiog-
raphy presents Jewish Islamization as a rare phenomenon and mainly
as the result of a deliberate policy by the government to put pressure
on the Jews to convert.6 The following discussion offers another per-
spective for understanding Jewish conversion and will present it as a
familiar and tempting phenomenon in Jewish life in Yemen.

The Legal and Socioeconomic Status of the Jews

During the first half of the twentieth century, the Yemeni population
was estimated at between 3.5 and 4 million. The number of Yemeni
Jews was estimated at 60 to 70 thousand, and they represented the larg-
est religious minority. (Another minority was composed of a small
number of urban Hindi merchants.) Yemeni society is tribal in charac-
ter.7 The tribes are sedentary, making their living from agriculture, and
are organized as armed political units. Until the 1970s, 97 percent of
the Yemeni population lived in the tribal-rural districts in tens of thou-
sands of small settlements.8 About 85 percent of the Jews lived in the [91]
tribal-rural areas, alongside the mainly Zaydi Muslim inhabitants, in
more than a thousand small, even tiny, settlements. The remainder Jews Converting
to Islam
lived in the capital of Sanaa and in a number of towns. After the 1630s,
following about a century of Ottoman occupation, Yemen was governed •
Bat-Zion Eraqi
by Zaydi imams. In 1872, the Ottomans reoccupied central Yemen and Klorman
the Red Sea coastal plain, and they remained until 1918. The rest of
Yemen continued to be governed by Zaydi imams.
After the Ottoman withdrawal, a Zaydi leader—Imam Yahya ibn
Muhammad al-Mutawakkil (r. 1918–48)—once again took over the
government of Yemen. Subsequently, Zaydi imams ruled Yemen until
the republican revolution of 1962. Like the Atlas tribes of southern
Morocco, who since the sixteenth century have consistently defied
the authority of the sharifian sultan,9 the Yemeni tribes, though for-
mally accepting the imams’ leadership, resisted efforts by any central
government to dominate them. Yemen’s tribal-territorial division was
further enhanced by the religious differences between its Sunni-
Shafi’i tribes and Shi’i-Zaydi tribes as well as by the country’s rugged
mountainous terrain. The period under consideration witnessed re-
markable political development as a result of the increased interven-
tion of Western powers in the Red Sea area and particularly the 1839
capture of Aden by the British, who remained there until 1967. Thus,
despite the fact that Yemen had never been directly affected by West-
ern colonial powers, during this period it began a slow process of
modernization and was pushed into the world economy. Economic
changes, especially the import of industrial goods, weakened the eco-
nomic base of the Jewish community, whose members engaged
mainly in crafts. Some Jewish artisans became migrant laborers in
Aden and in African centers across the Red Sea, some turned to ped-
dling and commerce, and others emigrated from Yemen. Between
1881 and 1914, about 8 percent of Yemeni Jews immigrated to Pales-
tine. This emigration continued in 1920, soon after World War I.

Dhimma Status
During the entire period under consideration, Jews were legally de-
fined as dhimmis, protected people lacking political rights. As in North
Africa, where there were no other significant religious minorities, the
term dhimmis, originally designated by the shari‘a to describe non-
Muslims living under Islam, became identical with Jews.10 The Jews
 were granted religious freedom and assurances of personal security
and property in exchange for their acknowledgment of Muslim politi-
[92] cal and social supremacy, which was conveyed by the payment of the
jizya (poll tax), and obedience to a list of restrictions as detailed in the
Jewish shari‘a. For example, Jews were required to wear distinguishing clothes;
Social they could ride a donkey only side-saddle and were not allowed to ride
Studies horses at all; and their homes could not rise above those of the Mus-
• lims. The Ottomans tried to equalize the Yemeni Jews’ legal status to
Vol. 14 that of other Jews in the empire but were thwarted by the vigorous op-
No. 1 position of the Yemeni population and religious scholars. Thus, restric-
tions that had gradually been lifted in other Muslim lands since the
middle of the nineteenth century were still in effect in Yemen, even
after the last major Jewish emigration in 1950.11

Communal Organization
An outstanding characteristic of communal life in Yemen that reflected
the country’s geography, demography, and political nature was the ab-
sence of any meaningful central organization. Communal structures
on the national and local district levels were weak, and each community
managed its own affairs. Most communities were small, at times num-
bering only three or four families. The aqil (secular leader) represented
the Jews vis-à-vis the authorities, and the mori (rabbi) managed religious
life. The mori was often the judge who settled religious and civil cases.
However, in all matters that did not concern family law, his authority
competed with that of the local sheikh or the district qadi ( judge). Jews
often appealed to the Muslim judicial system both because their courts
lacked the power of enforcement and because of their integration into
the tribal system. The Jews did not pay regular communal tax. Conse-
quently, charity and welfare, like other communal activities, were not
regularized. Most of these were conducted voluntarily on a personal
basis. (Only in Sanaa did the community fund organized charity activi-
ties.) This system usually functioned well, but in times of crisis and gen-
eral hardship it totally collapsed.12 After the mid-nineteenth century,
Jewish communal organization was affected by the opening of Yemen
to outside influences. Jewish emigration, shifts of employment, and en-
lightenment trends13 all weakened the Jewish community’s ability to su-
pervise and control the conduct of its members.
Tribal Protection
The discriminatory restrictions were strictly observed in Sanaa and
[93]
its environs and in a few towns where the imams exercised direct con-
trol; however, most Jews resided in areas dominated by tribal sheikhs Jews Converting
who did not strictly enforce these laws. While officially recognizing to Islam
the imam’s sovereignty, in practice the tribesmen maintained their •
independence and customary laws (‘urf ), which included protection Bat-Zion Eraqi
of the Jews. Thus, for instance, though homes in the Jewish quarter of Klorman
Sanaa were kept lower than Muslims’ houses, there was no difference
in height between Jewish and Muslim houses in the tribal-rural dis-
tricts. In the north and the northeast of Yemen, Jews even carried
arms, much like the tribesmen. In the tribal areas, the Jews lived
under the protection of the sheikhs and other members of the tribe
in a sort of client-patron relationship. Each Jewish household had
special ties with a Muslim jar (patron, or one who has a patron) and
helped him in time of need. Offending his Jew was taken by the Mus-
lim jar as an offense to his honor. Sometimes tribes went to war
against each other because a Jewish jar had been attacked, and it
would be shameful for them not to respond.14 Notions of honor and
shame similarly regulated Muslim-Jewish relations and protection
traditions in the tribal areas of southern Morocco and in rural Libya
during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, specifically in
regard to traveling Jewish peddlers.15 In the Yemeni arena, however,
these codes related to the Jews living within the tribe. Thus, though
Yemeni Jews were officially inferior, second-class subjects and were
considered a weak segment attached to a particular tribe,16 they were
tied to the tribe through the laws of protection, and in many respects
their lives resembled the lives of their Muslim neighbors.

Jews in the Economy

Although most of the Jews in Yemen lived in tribal-rural areas, only a
few engaged in agriculture. The majority worked as artisans and sup-
pliers of services to the Muslim farmers, and they engaged in retail
trade and peddling (an occupation that, as mentioned above, in-
creased after the turn of the nineteenth century). The economic
foundation of Jewish life in rural areas was the umla, the permanent
liaison between a Jewish artisan and a number of Muslims, each
called amil. Throughout the year, the artisan provided the farmer
with all the services and goods he needed for his farm and house-
hold; at harvest time the farmer paid his debt in field crops. Each
 party could engage in a number of umla agreements—the Jewish ar-
tisan with several Muslim families in his village, in other villages, or
[94] even with a whole village, and the Muslim farmer with different arti-
sans according to their expertise.17 In addition to its economic advan-
Jewish tages, the umla relationship contributed to the social solidarity
Social between Jewish and Muslim members of Yemeni society, creating
Studies strong bonds of fidelity between the two parties.18 The phenomenon
• of Jewish conversion needs to be examined, therefore, against the
Vol. 14 background of Jewish life within a tribal society and its multiple at-
No. 1 tractions and also in view of the social developments of the period.

Reasons for Islamization

Famine
Yemen’s economy was based on agriculture, which depended, at least
until the second half of the nineteenth century, on the monsoon
rains of spring and summer. In times of drought, plants died, food
was scarce, and economic activity came practically to a halt, resulting
in famine and starvation. During such times, the authorities and/or
charity establishments distributed food rations to hungry Muslims.
Jews who had converted to Islam could also receive provisions.19
Being a weak sector in the society, Jews were, in times of calamity,
reduced to a state of great distress. Their wish to survive led to con-
version, at times even on a large scale. For example, during the fam-
ine of 1724, more than 700 Jews were reported to have converted and
thereafter received food rations.20 An anonymous letter from the
nineteenth century tells of Jews, the writer’s son among them, who
left their homes in search of a livelihood. In the course of their wan-
derings, many died of hunger or were preyed on by wild animals,
while others converted.21 Similarly, during the famine caused by
Imam Yahya’s siege on Sanaa in 1903–04 as part of his rebellion
against the Ottomans, a number of Jews converted.22 An account sub-
mitted to the Jewish agency in the early 1940s reported Jewish or-
phans who “converted as a result of hunger.” 23
Heavy taxation did not play a role in Jewish Islamization in
Yemen.24 Yemeni Jews were obliged to pay only the jizya (although in
the towns occasional fines were levied on them), which in the rural-
tribal districts was not meticulously collected. In fact, the legal tax re-
quired from the Jews, at least during the twentieth century, was
generally lighter than that collected from Muslims.25
Improving Social and Economic Status
As dhimmis, Jews were excluded from social mobility within the Ye-
[95]
meni society. Even capable Jews could have no significant impact on
the affairs of the state, and the wealthy were required to conceal their Jews Converting
wealth. External expressions of affluence, like elaborate attire or or- to Islam
namented homes, defied the Muslims and were perceived as chal- •
lenging the covenant of the dhimma. Thus, as in other parts of the Bat-Zion Eraqi
Muslim world (and much like in the Christian world before the twen- Klorman
tieth century), those who wished to improve their social status and
economic conditions within the larger society could do so only if they
converted.26 Nissim, who lived in the settlement of al-Radma in the
Yarim district, exemplifies the desire to belong to the majority soci-
ety. He specialized in medicine and treated many Jewish and Muslim
patients, especially by summoning demons for healing purposes. At
the end of the 1930s, he moved to the al-Mahwit district, where he
posed as a Muslim and pursued his practice. When discovered to be a
Jew, he announced his wish to convert. His name was changed to Ab-
dalla al-Mahwiti, and he then joined the imam’s army. Soon after, he
was promoted to the rank of officer.27
In addition, unfortunate and lonely Jews who were not cared for by
their small and feeble community often turned to the tribal organi-
zation for support. Such people, usually men, were not in dire straits
but were poor and hungry. Sometimes they lived on the margins of
the Jewish community. Jewish sources state that “Muslims tempted
them to Islamize, they offered them good food.” 28 For example, dur-
ing the 1920s, a needy young Jewish man from the village of al-Jum‘ah
(in the Khawlan district) approached Ahmad ibn ‘Ali, the sheikh of
the village, “on account of hunger,” and asked to convert. He Is-
lamized, married a Muslim girl, and had children.29 During the early
1940s, a 13-year-old youth from Damt with no visible family was found
wandering around and was fed occasionally by Jewish families. “The
Arabs recognized that he was drifting, and the sheikhs managed to
tempt him and to lead him astray.” He converted, and the Muslims
“made of him a soldier in Damt and they gave him a gun.”30

Love and Marriage

The living conditions within Muslim society and the close economic
contacts between Muslims and Jews created acquaintances from
which romantic ties and sometimes even marriages developed. All
such marriages (with rare exceptions) resulted in the conversion of
 the Jewish party, man or woman.31 It is safe to assume that love and
marriage were frequently the excuse and the means for Jews who were
[96] attracted to the Muslim community to be easily assimilated into it.
Perceived as inferior and weak, Jewish men were not considered a
Jewish danger to Muslim women’s honor and modesty. Whereas strange
Social Muslim men were forbidden to enter the household and to remain in
Studies private with the women of the house, dhimmis were allowed to do
• so.32 Some Jewish craftsmen who worked in Muslim homes, at times
Vol. 14 staying for a few weeks, developed more than working relations with
No. 1 the women of the house. For example, during the 1930s, 24-year-old
Yosef Ben Shlomo, a married man with two children from the Mza-
hin district, fell in love with Shamsa, the daughter of his Muslim em-
ployer. He converted and married her.33 In 1943, Nadra of ‘Amran, a
Jew, fell in love with a young officer in the imam’s garrison. In coop-
eration with her lover, she tricked her family, left her home, and en-
tered the governor’s house. There she Islamized and immediately
married. Following protests from her family, her sister was allowed to
see her and to check the sincerity of her conversion. Nadra an-
nounced: “I Islamized of my free will, nothing will help you!” 34
The conversion of Jewish men and women and their marriage to Mus-
lims continued for as long as there were Jews living in Yemen. The major-
ity of Yemen’s Jews immigrated to Israel in 1949–50; others joined their
families in the course of the 1950s and the beginning of the 1960s, until
the republican revolution of 1962 stopped Jewish emigration. As of the
early 1990s, however, Jews were allowed to leave Yemen. A few hundred
Jews arrived in Israel, among them families in which some members
(men and women) had married Muslims and remained in Yemen.35

Love—From Islam to Judaism

Conversions from Islam to Judaism were rare. I found only two such
cases documented, both relating to Muslim women, and both at-
tracted enormous attention and aroused astonishment. The first case
is from the 1930s, told with great empathy and sorrow for its tragic
end. It tells of Yosef Halevi from the village of al-Haddad (in the
‘Amar district) and a young woman, Bint al-Basara, of a notable Mus-
lim family in his village, who fell in love. The couple ran away to Aden
(which was a British protectorate), planning to continue on to Pales-
tine. The girl converted to Judaism, and they married. It is said that
news about the couple’s escape spread quickly and aroused the anger
of her family and of the village sheikh, as well as great embarrass-
ment and shock to both Jews and Muslims. Messengers were sent to
Aden to fetch the two, and, when found, they were extradited with
the help of the local Arab police to Yemeni forces. The two were
brought to trial in al-Nadra, the capital of their district, and were sen- [97]
tenced to life imprisonment. (Halevi refused an offer to convert in
lieu of prison.) In addition, Bint al-Basara was punished in a proces- Jews Converting
to Islam
sion of disgrace and humiliation (dardahah). Badly treated in prison,
she died soon after. Halevi managed to escape from prison. He •
Bat-Zion Eraqi
reached Aden, from there traveled to Asmara in Eritrea, and eventu- Klorman
ally immigrated to Palestine.36 The extraordinary love of Bint al-Ba-
sara and Yosef Halevi was recorded in folk songs, a number of which
were transcribed (in both Arabic and Hebrew characters).37
The second case, of 1948, had a “happy ending.” It relates to a
young Jewish man, married and the father of a baby boy, who lived in
a village near the town of al-Mahwit. He used to work during the week
in the surrounding villages, sleeping in the homes of his Muslim em-
ployers, and returning home for the Sabbath. He worked for about a
month in Bani Hasan, making pillows and mattresses in the house of
the village sheikh. During this time he fell in love with the sheikh’s
daughter. He deserted his wife and son, the girl left her father’s
house, and both headed for the British protectorate of Aden. They
reached the Hashid transit camp, where Yemeni Jews were awaiting
their turn to travel to Israel. The camp managers immediately flew
the woman to Israel, and she was sent to an immigrant camp in Atlit.
About two months later, her lover joined her, she converted, and they
married.38 Political developments (the establishment of the State of
Israel and its agents’ activities in Aden) and the couple’s ability to
leave Yemen immediately were the prime factors that enabled them
to continue their life as Jews.

Refuge Within the Muslim Society

Jews also converted as a result of discontent and anger toward their
family and community and the wish to take vengeance. By adopting
Islam, estranged Jews could enjoy the protection and support of the
tribe. Muslim society could serve as a comforting alternative to sor-
row and frustration in a person’s life. Now and then, Jews converted
as a means to avoid punishment by the Jewish community after com-
mitting unlawful acts. At times, Islamization was a way to escape ac-
tual suffering to which Jewish law did not offer a solution. Women
with marital problems would threaten their families that they would
convert unless the problem was solved. Below are some examples of
the appeal of Muslim society for such individuals.
 At the beginning of the twentieth century, a young Jewish man
from al-Juruf wished to marry young Rumya. His father did not ap-
[98] prove and planned to marry him to another girl. In response, the
man joined the tribesmen who entered the mosque for the noon
Jewish prayer, dropped his headgear, “and shouted: God will cause the faith
Social of the Muslims to prosper, and thereafter [he] converted.”39 In an-
Studies other instance, following an argument in the synagogue of al-Bayda,
• the man involved in the dispute went to the Muslim quarter and Is-
Vol. 14 lamized. A few hours later he returned to the Jewish neighborhood in
No. 1 triumph, his side-locks shaved, riding on a mule, and armed with a
rifle.40 In 1944, a Jewish man from al-Saddah Islamized. His conver-
sion is presented as the result of continuous disagreements with his
wife. It is said that the man used to leave his family for weeks or even
months and work as a craftsman in Muslim villages. His wife pro-
tested his long absences and complained that he did not adequately
support his family. Their tense relationship (and probably the cozi-
ness he felt within the Muslim environment) pushed him to Islam. It
is said that his vengeance toward his wife was complete when he in-
sisted that his minor son join him.41
At the end of the 1940s in northern Yemen, an only son to parents
who had “pampered him since childhood and gave him all the best,”
went astray and committed unspecified “bad deeds.” It is related that
the young man did not want to better his ways; he was so bad that his
family gave up on him. Members of the Jewish community disassoci-
ated themselves from him. Consequently, the man entered the gover-
nor’s home, said that he wished to become a Muslim, and converted.42
In the same period, also in northern Yemen, when her husband was
away on business, a married Jewish woman and mother of two had an
affair with her Muslim neighbor. When the matter was discovered,
fearing the reaction of her family, the woman escaped to the authori-
ties, asked to convert, and Islamized.43
Another case is that of the young Dabya, who in 1931 married the
peddler Yahya Hilba of Bayhan. When Hilba was away from home for
weeks, his pregnant wife befriended her Muslim neighbors. She de-
cided to Islamize and converted a few weeks before the birth of her son.
In spite of Hilba’s protests, the child remained with his mother and was
raised as a Muslim.44 There were also women who adopted Islam in
order to escape from bad marriages.45 Soon thereafter most married
into the Muslim community. It should be noted that, according to the
shari‘a, once a woman (or man) is Islamized, her previous marriage is
automatically annulled. Jewish law, however, regards a married person
who converts as still married. Habiba Sanani, for example, was married
to Salih al-Dahri; they lived in Rada and had a daughter and a son.
“[H]er husband was bullying her, she wanted to divorce him but he re-
fused to give her a get [divorce], so that her remedy was to Islamize [in [99]
the mid 1940s].”46 Similarly, in the mid-1940s, a young woman from the
border town Qa‘taba was the second wife of Yosef Yahya, an older man Jews Converting
to Islam
who “in his later years desired a young beautiful girl.” The woman
wanted a divorce, but he refused; “one day she slipped out to Dar al- •
Bat-Zion Eraqi
Jumruk (customs house) and converted there.”47 Even at the end of the Klorman
twentieth century, Jewish women escaped bad marriages by means of
conversion. A traveler who visited Yemen in 1989 tells of a young woman
whose father married her to an older man, but “the marriage did not
work out because of the age difference and the husband’s behavior.
When she could not bear living with her husband, she fled to her fa-
ther’s house.” The father pressured his daughter to return to her hus-
band’s house, but she responded by escaping to the house of the sheikh.
She Islamized and married a Muslim.48
Women also used the threat of Islamization as a weapon. For ex-
ample, after her marriage in 1940 to Salim ‘Uzayri, Wala Mahadun of
Saqin refused to have relations with him. Knowing that her parents
would not approve of her stubbornness, she fled to the sheikh’s house
and asked for refuge. She announced that she would rather Islamize
than return to her husband. Wala remained in the sheikh’s house,
under the patronage of his wife, for about a month, until a divorce
was arranged. Thereafter, she returned to her parents’ house.49 Also
in the 1940s, a 12-year-old girl from northern Yemen was married by
her father to a 40-year-old divorced man. A few days after their mar-
riage, the frightened bride fled from her husband to her parents’
house. Her father rebuked her and demanded that she return to her
husband. She refused and said that, if she were forced to go back, she
would convert. Two months later, the couple was divorced. 50

Alternative to Punishment
In Yemen, as in other Muslim countries, dhimmis who were sentenced
in Muslim courts to heavy fines, long terms of imprisonment, or death
could escape punishment if Islamized.51 Yosef al-Shaykh Levi, for ex-
ample, was in charge of the state’s mint. In 1846, he changed the ratio
of the silver and copper that constituted the Yemeni coin by enlarg-
ing the amount of copper, and he embezzled the difference. When
the fraud was discovered, the Jewish silversmiths who worked at the
mint were heavily fined. Al-Shaykh Levi was ordered to pay an ex-
tremely high fine that there was no conceivable way he could pay.
 Thus, he was sentenced to death but promised a pardon if Islamized.
He soon converted.52 In 1877, a young Jewish man was imprisoned in
[100] Sanaa (the result of “a false charge”). He declared that he wished to
convert and be pardoned.53 In the village of al-Gadas, sometime in
Jewish the first half of the twentieth century, a Jewish youth stole from his fa-
Social ther’s house. The father reported his son to the local sheikh so that
Studies he would punish him. Wishing to escape punishment, and probably
• out of anger at his father, the youth Islamized.54 And in the mid-
Vol. 14 1940s, a Jew from Shagadra committed a crime and awaited impris-
No. 1 onment. Instead, he Islamized, taking his two young daughters with
him.55 Nevertheless, the Muslim authorities did not always approve Is-
lamization as an alternative to punishment.56

Islamization Instead of Emigration from Yemen

During the Jewish emigration from Yemen to Palestine that began in
1881 and culminated in the mass migration to Israel in 1949–50,
some of the Jews, reluctant to leave their homeland, chose to remain.
Among those who remained were whole families and married indi-
viduals—mainly men but also women—whose spouses left. These
people found it difficult to live apart, with no religious-communal
structure to provide support. Some of them converted and merged
into Yemeni Muslim society.57
In 1942, for example, Yehiel and Yosef Mabari immigrated to Pales-
tine. Their mother, brother, and stepfather remained in the Hajjah dis-
trict and Islamized.58 In 1949, Yaaqov Madhala left northern Yemen for
Palestine and settled in Rehovot. His wife, Salha, and their son and
daughter remained and Islamized.59 In 1950, most of the Jews of the
Bayhan district immigrated to Israel, but some remained in Yemen and
Islamized.60 One of those who were reluctant to leave was Yosef Itrib, a
widowed father of nine-year-old Hayyim. He said that he would stay
until he repaid his debt to Muhammad ‘Awad of Bayhan, and he re-
fused to leave even when his creditor forgave his debt and said that he
did not want to hinder Itrib’s journey to Israel. A few months later, Itrib
passed away. Before his death, he asked al-Sharif Hausayn, one of the
local notables, to care for his son. The boy was raised as a Muslim and
renamed ‘Abdalla Muhammad al-Muslimani Itrib.61
In 1950, Rabbi Zadoc ‘Umaysi left Shar’ab for Aden together with
other Jews who immigrated to Israel. He stayed in Aden and served as
a ritual slaughterer (shohet) for the Adeni Jewish community until
1967, when the British left Aden and he immigrated to Israel. In
Aden, ‘Umaysi also operated as liaison between Yemeni Jews in Israel
and Jews who remained in Yemen, and he took steps to solve the prob-
lems of deserted women (agunot) who had immigrated to Israel while
their husbands remained. According to ‘Umaysi, in 1955 or 1956, in [101]
one village in the Rada district, about 70 Jews Islamized. ‘Umaysi
claims that the decision to convert was because of “one Jewish woman” Jews Converting
to Islam
who convinced the Jews of that village that they had lost any chance
to leave Yemen and immigrate to Israel. She “induced” them to con- •
Bat-Zion Eraqi
vert, “and on Friday 70 people went to the mosque and Islamized.” Klorman
Sometime after their conversion, 36 of them immigrated to Israel;
the rest remained in Yemen as Muslims.62

The Conversion Ceremony

The religious and social changes in a convert’s life were signified by a

series of ceremonies:
First, pronouncing the shahada (“There is no God but Allah and
Muhammad is the messenger of Allah”). This is the only act of reli-
gious significance required by law to turn a person into a Muslim.
Second, eating soup made from meat slaughtered according to Is-
lamic law,63 a ceremony unique to Yemen. This act is reminiscent of
the active participation of the convert during conversion ceremonies
in Christianity: eating the holy bread, drinking the wine, and bap-
tism. Eating the meat soup, more than uttering the shahada, was per-
ceived as a magical act that erased, so to speak, the Jewish being of
the convert and prepared him to adopt his Muslim identity. Apart
from marriage, religious laws regarding slaughtering were the most
noted barrier between Jews and Muslims in Yemen and hindered
wider social interaction.64 Jewish guests in Muslim homes ate bread
and milk products produced by Muslims.65 In meat dishes, however,
separation was complete and prohibition absolute. The meaning of
eating the meat soup was far intensified because of both the prohibi-
tion and the affinity between the two communities. The soup became
the symbol of separation and distance between Jews and Muslims.
Deviation in public from Jewish dietary laws signaled to Jews and
Muslims that a most remarkable difference in their daily conduct had
been removed—a Jew had deserted Judaism and his Jewish commu-
nity in favor of Islam.66 The following passage relates to northern
Yemen at the end of the nineteenth century. Even if not precise in all
its details, it illustrates the strict interpretation given by Jews to the
eating of Muslim meat, even to the point that unintentional or un-
knowing eating was taken as an act of conversion:
 A man from the al-Qamas family used go around the villages as a ped-
dler and tailor. One day he fell ill with the plague that inflicted the area.
[102] Because of his illness, he was detained in one of the villages, where an
Arab family took him in and nursed him. He suffered from high tem-
perature and was not conscious of his surroundings. The woman of the
Jewish
house fed him and gave him soup to drink. When he regained con-
Social
sciousness, she came to him with a bowl of soup. When he saw her he
Studies said: “Please do not give me soup, [because] I am a Jew.” She said to him:
• “If not for this soup that I gave you to drink, you would not have sur-
Vol. 14 vived and you would not be alive.”
No. 1 When Qamas returned to his family in Haydan, he asked them to
give him a punishment of flogging to atone for his sin.67 But they said to
him: “It is impossible, you are already a gentile!” He had no choice and
he went among the gentiles; he Islamized and had a family. His descen-
dants used to come to the village of al-Hajar in the Haydan district and
say to the Jews: “We are from you” [nahnu minkum].68

Third, removing external Jewish characteristics, such as cutting

the Jewish convert’s side locks and sometimes shaving his head like
the tribesmen of the area. Much like the appearance of the free Ye-
meni warrior of the tribe, the convert’s Jewish dress was replaced by
Muslim clothing, and he was given a jambbiyah (dagger) and a rifle.
Fourth, changing the convert’s name to a Muslim name—usually
‘Abdallah or Muhammad, to which was affixed the name Muhtadi
(the one who goes in the right path), instead of the father’s or the
family name.69 (I did not find changed names of women converts.)
Fifth and finally, in some places conversion ceremonies were con-
cluded by a happy procession—the playing of drums and wind instru-
ments, with the convert riding on a horse to the mosque.70 The participants
used to cry out: “God will cause the faith of the Muslims to prosper!”

The Attitude of the Muslims to Jewish Conversions

Yemeni Muslims were pleased to have Jewish converts, and they en-
couraged them. This is well demonstrated in supplying food condi-
tional on conversion, in the joyful expressions at the conversion
ceremonies, and in the efforts to help converts adjust to the new soci-
ety.71 The convert was treated in a protective manner designed to sub-
stitute for the cohesion of the Jewish community. The Muslims
“honored him and gave him a house and house articles and all his ne-
cessities, as was customary regarding apostates.” 72 Now and then, con-
verts who had no source of income received, in addition to initial
economic aid, a position in the army as exemplified by the case de-
scribed above of ‘Abdallah al-Mahwiti. He was taken into the imam’s
army, where he later reached officer’s rank.73 [103]
Nevertheless, it is hard to point to a specific master policy directed
at Islamizing the Jews of Yemen. On the contrary, the Yemeni authori- Jews Converting
to Islam
ties did not accept new converts in every case. They often checked the
sincerity of the request to convert and whether it was made with suffi- •
Bat-Zion Eraqi
cient deliberation. Thus, in 1887, Ma’uda Ibn Hasan al-Shajari of
Klorman
Sanaa was seemingly on his way to Islam but had not yet decided. He
moved from the Jewish quarter of Sanaa to the Muslim neighborhood,
and he ceased to participate in Jewish rituals. The Jewish court ruled
that he should return to the Jewish quarter and forced him to do so
with the help of Sheikh Qasim Ahmad Salih, to whom al-Shajari
agreed to pay a fine if he did not comply with the court ruling.74 Al-
Shajari’s return was thus coordinated by the Jewish leadership to-
gether with a Muslim authority. In addition, the two conversion cases
in the late 1940s in northern Yemen, mentioned earlier, were com-
pleted only after the authorities had verified that the parties under-
stood their motion and were adopting Islam wholeheartedly. When
the Jewish woman who had romantic relations with her Muslim neigh-
bor fled to the governor’s house asking to convert, the governor and
his assistants “tried to persuade her not to take this step, and they
warned her a few times lest she would regret it, but they were not suc-
cessful.” 75 Similarly, the young Jew who was rejected by the Jewish com-
munity on account of his “bad deeds” was not immediately accepted
by the Muslim community. The governor tried to persuade him to give
up his plan to convert. Only after insisting that he had come to the de-
cision of his own free will and that he had no request or condition for
his Islamization did the authorities accept his proposal.76
In 1943, Imam Yahya inspected a complaint by the mother of
young Nadra of ‘Amran who had Islamized and married an officer in
his army. The mother claimed that her daughter was cunningly taken
from her house and forced to convert, and she asked to get her daugh-
ter back. After examining the case, the imam found that Nadra had
converted willingly. Thereafter he dismissed the mother’s plea.77
What was the attitude toward the convert following the joyful cere-
monies? The picture is incomplete because of a lack of relevant Ara-
bic sources and fieldwork in Yemen. The prevalence of the
phenomenon, however, suggests that the converts generally inte-
grated into Muslim society. As to Jewish sources, they naturally at-
tempt to present the absorption into Muslim society as difficult and
unsuccessful. They report that the Muslims treated the convert with
 suspicion and viewed him with contempt,78 and they cite a Muslim
saying “qad al-yahudi yahudi walaw aslama” (a Jew remains a Jew even
[104] if Islamized).79 According to Nissim Binyamin Gamlieli, there were
some villages whose inhabitants were probably of Jewish origin; they
Jewish were degradingly called al-muhtadyin and were treated with dislike.80
Social He also said that a muhtadi could not marry a tribeswoman unless he
Studies was well off.81 Some Yemeni expressions reflect the Muslim attitude
• toward Jews or Jewish converts: parents used to scold their unruly
Vol. 14 children by calling them “ibn (bint) Yahudi!” (Son [daughter] of a
No. 1 Jew!).82 These expressions raise a question as to how successful the
converts were in fully assimilating into Muslim society.

The Attitude of the Jews to Conversion and to the Converts

Jewish sources differ in their attitude toward the phenomenon of

conversion and toward individual converts. The phenomenon in gen-
eral is described with rage and contempt. It is presented as deserting
the true faith and a rich heritage for a lesser religion of inferior cul-
tural values, and as a betrayal of the family and community. The ini-
tial moral and spiritual values of the converts are sometimes
minimized by employing the sayings: “Whatever belongs to them re-
turns to them,” 83 and “Their soul was defective.” 84 The converts’
achievements in Muslim society are usually downplayed: “Most of
them are poor and miserable. The religion of Muhammad did not el-
evate them; on the contrary, it degraded them.” 85 Sources that discuss
conversions as a result of famine, however, describe the phenomenon
as a necessity of life and not as a betrayal.
As to the individual converts, a female convert is always referred to
with disrespect. Her morality is questionable, and her marriage to a
Muslim is presented as a bad bargain.86 About the woman from Qa‘taba
who ran away from her husband, it is said that the governor “married
her to one of his lesser servants, a strong man with big muscles, and she
produced his offspring like a bitch.”87 The northern Yemeni woman
who Islamized at the end of the 1940s is presented as a “wicked woman”
and “deviating from the right path.”88 The attitude toward the male
convert, however, is usually ambivalent. Reservations are emphasized,
yet there is no effort to avoid keeping in touch with him, his help is ac-
cepted, and he is helped. The texts even reveal a sort of attraction and
admiration for his new personality and status. Shalom Gamliel sought
the help of a muhtadi in his dispute with other members of the Sanaa
Jewish community.89 And the description of Yusuf ibn Ibrahim al-
‘Uzani (formerly Yosef ben Shlomo), the convert from Mzahin, portrays
him as a sheikh, his noble appearance reflecting wealth and power. It is
said that he used to come to the weekly market, “and when he recog- [105]
nized one of his [old] community, he would attend to him and ask
about his well being. . . . Indeed, many of the community members, his Jews Converting
to Islam
former friends, approached him, and were on their part welcoming . . .
feeling affection toward him in mercy and pity.” Yosef ben Shlomo’s •
Bat-Zion Eraqi
love and marriage to Muslim Shamsa, with whom he was acquainted
Klorman
early in his life, is explained with empathy and forgiveness: “Beyond
carnal love and lust, it was something that was sowed in him since child-
hood, and also in her, in Shamsa, it was sowed since childhood, some-
thing of the mind that forces itself on a person.” 90
The representation of Yusuf al-‘Uzani as a sheikh and the descriptions
of other converts also reflect these people’s feelings of superiority toward
their former coreligionists. They exhibit their higher status and look
down on those who remained Jews at the bottom of the social hierarchy.
The ambivalent attitude toward the convert does not contradict the
Jewish legal approach, which perceives the convert as “Israel who went
astray” and whose Jewish identity does not evaporate with conversion.91
Therefore, Jews helped converts who wished to return to Judaism. Oc-
casionally such Jews were judged in a rabbinic court and sentenced to
40 lashes, but most were not punished.92 From the Muslim legal point
of view, apostates that left Islam were to be judged and severely pun-
ished; hence, many such Jews left their villages and settled elsewhere.
Yet often Muslims closed their eyes to the return of converts to Judaism.
For example, in al-Gadas at the beginning of the twentieth century, a
hungry woman and a young man converted. After a while they returned
to Judaism and the local tribesmen did not bother them.93 The youth
from Damt mentioned above, who Islamized in the 1940s and became a
soldier, fell very sick. Gamlieli relates that, since there was no one to
care for the youth, his mother Zihra nurtured him and fed him. When
he was cured, the convert asked her: “What shall I do now?” She told
him: “Run away!” He ran away to Aden. He then returned to Judaism
and thereafter immigrated to Israel.94 Gamlieli speaks of yet another
Jewish convert from Damt who returned to Judaism. This man was dis-
appointed with the attitude of the sheikh “through whom he was Is-
lamized,” and he sought to escape him. He hid for a few weeks in
Gamlieli’s house, until his beard and side locks grew, then slipped away
to Aden and continued his life as a Jew.95
As mentioned above, the immigration of Yemeni Jews to Israel in
1949–50 resulted in the Islamization of some of the Jews who chose to
remain in Yemen. This dramatic development also promoted a re-
 verse process: the return of converts to Judaism and their departure
from Yemen with the rest of the Jews and their immigration to Israel.
[106] Among them were some of the individuals described earlier, like Ab-
dallah al-Mahwiti96 and the Jew from al-Shagadra with his two
Jewish daughters.97
Social
Studies
• The Converts and Their Jewish Family
Vol. 14
No. 1 Because Jewish religious law views converts as still being Jews, these
people often continued to touch on the lives of their Jewish families in
matters like inheritance,98 child custody, and deserted women, and in
issues related to levirate laws. Converted men and women who wished
to have custody of their children were always permitted to keep them.99
Sometimes Jewish family law could not solve problems that arose fol-
lowing the conversion of married men. A number of converts agreed to
divorce their wives;100 others left their wives deserted, unable to re-
marry.101 This phenomenon increased with the 1949–50 emigration
and the Islamization of Jewish men who remained in Yemen. The rab-
binical court in Aden, in cooperation with rabbinical authorities in Is-
rael, sent Jewish messengers to Yemen to search for the husbands and
convince them to sign a get. A few of the men did so, but others refused
to cooperate or were not found.102
Another legal complexity arose in cases of converted levirates.
When the husband dies and the couple is childless, Jewish law de-
mands that the woman’s brother-in-law, the levirate (yavam), marry
her or, alternately, release her in a halitsah ceremony (when she takes
off the yavam’s shoe). A converted yavam who refused to cooperate or
who disappeared in the Muslim surroundings left his Jewish sister-in-
law chained to him and unable to have a family.103

Conclusion

It is impossible to estimate the number of Jewish converts or the ex-

tent of the phenomenon of Islamization. It is safe, however, to state
that Islamization was an existing and tempting possibility that mate-
rialized not only at the margins of Jewish society but also closer to the
center. Saloniki-born merchant David Qaraso, who stayed in Otto-
man Yemen in 1880–85, describes Jewish conversion as a common
phenomenon: “[T]here is no year in which some Jews do not convert.
I saw in my own eyes more than 40 converts, among them fathers
whose sons remained Jews, and fathers and sons who converted, and
women too.”104
Nehemia Levtzion, who studied the conversion of non-Muslims in [107]
Muslim lands, concluded that social factors played the central role in
this phenomenon.105 Jewish Islamization in Yemen, as presented in this Jews Converting
to Islam
article, corresponds to this view. Various social considerations, derived
from the unique conditions in Yemen, persuaded Jews to convert, not •
Bat-Zion Eraqi
deliberate pressure or premeditated temptation by Muslim authorities
Klorman
and individuals, as suggested by other scholars.106 Similarly, the role of
religious conviction in this phenomenon seems insignificant. Against
the background of Jewish conversion, the Jewish communal institutions
grew weaker and were powerless against the tribe’s solidarity and the
strength of Muslim society and its institutions. Economic hardships and
cultural assimilation, which occurred through the close economic and
social ties between Jews and Muslims as well as through the laws of tribal
protection, contributed to this phenomenon. The small and weak Jew-
ish community with its hundreds of scattered settlements had difficulty
installing effective barriers that would prevent potential converts from
leaving the Jewish community—whether by means of communal pres-
sure or by taking care of the weak, the hungry, and the rejected. Among
those who were attracted to Muslim society and to the supportive tribal
structure were hungry persons, those who wished to improve their eco-
nomic and social status, men and women for whom the Jewish society
was not responsive to their agonies or was unable to tend to them, and
those who chose to remain in Yemen while their brethren emigrated.
It appears that, despite their religious and communal distinctive-
ness and its social implications, Yemeni Jews were part of the society
in which they lived. Uttering the shahada and eating meat soup thus
transferred the converts to a different yet familiar environment. This
analysis is true mainly of Jewish society in the tribal-rural districts. In
comparison, the largest and most organized Jewish community of
Sanaa was generally successful in monitoring the lives of its members
even during the political and socioeconomic developments of the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The Jews lived in the Jewish
quarter that was separated from the Muslim city, and their ties with
Yemeni Muslims were less extensive than those in the tribal space.
Jewish conversions in Sanaa were more apparent in times of famine
than for “regular” economic and social reasons, yet in the capital,
too, there were conversions on such grounds.
The Jewish theological approach toward Islam can probably be
seen as facilitating the process of conversion in Muslim lands.107 In
contrast to the religious antagonism and theological resistance of
 Jewish society toward Christianity, Jews perceived Islam, which op-
posed shirk (the association of other divine beings to God), as a mono-
[108] theistic religion that spread the belief in God’s undivided unity.108
This view contributed to Jewish practice in medieval Islam: when per-
Jewish secuted by Muslims, Jews chose to Islamize rather than commit acts
Social of martyrdom like Jews in Christian Europe.109 Likewise, the eigh-
Studies teenth-century Yemeni scholar Rabbi Said Sadi wrote: “Ein ha-yish-
• maelim ovdei avodah zarah” (the Muslims are not idolaters).110 Yet
Vol. 14 our discussion does not relate to Islamization as the result of religious
No. 1 conviction or attraction to the religious truth of Islam. It can be as-
sumed that such cases did exist, but, like in other Muslim countries,
they were exceptional.111 During the period under discussion, we do
not know of religious debates or inter-religious conversations on the
intellectual level, nor of the Islamization of rabbinic figures.112
The religious cultural climate in Yemen permitted a wide base for
dialogue as well as for disagreement and awareness of the differences
between Judaism and Islam (in matters like dietary laws and religious
festivals). Jewish men were literate, and most of them continued reli-
gious studies throughout their adult years. In this respect, they held
themselves to be religiously and culturally superior to the Muslim
tribesmen, only a few of whom knew how to read and write. The Jews,
who lived mainly in the tribal space and not near the Muslim learn-
ing centers in the towns, were attracted to Islam as a mighty commu-
nity and to its communal-tribal structure more than to its religious
principles. It is plausible, however, that the converts were absorbed
into the Muslim religious experience and that their new religion ful-
filled their spiritual needs. Their integration into Muslim society was
probably facilitated by the essential character of both Judaism and
Islam as religions that do not separate between religion and state and
are not based on belief (except for the unity of God) but on positive
commands. The saying “Nothing separates us except for ritual slaugh-
tering and marriage” was well known among the Jews of Yemen.113
Islamization served the converts, therefore, to redefine their iden-
tity. In Yemen, which did not undergo a process of secularization, the
individual’s place in society was determined by religious affiliation
and tribal association. Converts could change their identity from Ye-
meni Jews to Yemeni Muslims, who more strongly belonged to the
tribe and the surroundings in which they lived. Conversion enabled
them to identify with the Muslim political and social structure and
values, and to become immersed in it.
Notes

1 For legal debates regarding apostates (people who had been Muslims [109]
and renounced Islam), see Yohanan Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion
in Islam: Interfaith Relations in the Muslim Tradition (Cambridge, Engl., Jews Converting
2003), 121–59. to Islam
2 During the eighteenth century, Yemeni (Zaydi) legal interpretations •
formalized a unique statute, known in Jewish sources as the “Orphans’ Bat-Zion Eraqi
Decree,” that obligated the Yemeni state to take custody of dhimmi Klorman
(non-Muslim) children who had been orphaned and to raise them as
Muslims. Regarding this law and its implementation, see Bat-Zion
Eraqi Klorman, “The Forced Conversion of Jewish Orphans in Yemen,”
International Journal of Middle East Studies 33 (2001): 23–47.
3 For example, the Sanaa Jewish court records from the second half of
the eighteenth century up to the second half of the nineteenth century
(which are the only records that remained) register 20 cases related to
converts. See Yehiel Nahshon, “Ha-hanhagah ha-yehudit be-teman
(meot 18–19)” (Ph.D. diss., Bar-Ilan University, 1998), 167, 175–76.
4 See, e.g., Amram Qorah, Searat teman ( Jerusalem, 1954), 15; Said Sadi,
“Dofi ha-zman: Korot yehudei teman bi-shnot 5477–5486 (1717–1726),”
Sefunot 1 (1957): 59–116.
5 Shalom Lahav, “Yeladim she-uslemu be-teman,” Afikim 117–18 (2000):
56–58 and Afikim 119–20 (2001): 52–53, esp. 52; Yosef Tobi, “Ha-ke-
hilah ha-yehudit be-teman,” in his Moreshet yehudei teman: Iyunim u-meh-
karim ( Jerusalem, 1977), 87; Nissim Binyamin Gamlieli, Ahavat teman:
Ha-shirah ha-amamit ha-temanit—shirat ha-nashim (Tel Aviv, 1996), 244,
and an interview with me in June 1994; Shalom Benei Moshe, Ba-mesi-
lah naaleh (Rehovot, 1988), 101. Hereafter, all interviews cited were
conducted by me.
6 See, e.g., Yosef Tobi, “Ha-mivne ha-hevrati veha-kalkali shel yehudei
teman ba-meot ha-19 veha-20,” in his Yehudei teman ba-et ha-hadashah
( Jerusalem, 1984), 200; and Yosef Tobi, “Hitaslemut be-kerev yehudei
teman tahat ha-shilton ha-zaydi: Emdot ha-halakhah ha-zaydit, ha-shil-
ton ha-imami veha-hevrah ha-muslemit,” Peamim 42 (1990): 105–26,
esp. 122–23. Tobi wrote that Jewish existence in Yemen was perceived
by the Muslim society as “an anomaly that has to be altered by constant
pressure and various methods. This pressure was very efficient in con-
verting Jews to Islam.” See also Nissim Binyamin Gamlieli, Teman ba-
teudot: Yehudei damt veha-mahoz ( Jerusalem, 1998), 47, which describes
Jewish Islamization as a rare phenomenon, known mainly in Sanaa and
other towns and hardly ever in the small towns and villages, and Ye-
huda Ratzaby, Be-maaglot teman (Yemen Paths) (Tel Aviv, 1988), 234, re-
garding Islamization as a result of compulsion or as happening “by
force of the time and fatal circumstances.” About temptation, see Aha-
ron Gaimani, “Ha-yibum be-kerev benei teman le-halakhah ule-
maaseh,” Mi-mizrah umi-maarav 7 (2004): 85–115, esp. 105.
 7 For different aspects of tribal society, see Dale F. Eickelman, The Middle
East and Central Asia: An Anthropological Approach (Upper Saddle River,
[110] N.J., 1998). For the tribal society in Yemen, see Paul Dresch, Tribes, Gov-
ernment, and History in Yemen (Oxford, 1989).
8 The first population census was undertaken in North Yemen in 1975,
Jewish
according to which its population numbered about 4.7 million. For
Social
more about this census and its findings, see Manfred W. Wenner, The
Studies Yemen Arab Republic: Development and Change in an Ancient Land (Boul-
• der, Colo., 1991), 19–22.
Vol. 14 9 Shlomo Deshen, The Mellah Society: Jewish Community Life in Sherifian
No. 1 Morocco (Chicago, 1989), 17; Michael M. Laskier, North African Jewry in
the Twentieth Century (New York, 1994), 9.
10 Harvey E. Goldberg, Jewish Life in Muslim Libya: Rivals and Relatives
(Chicago, 1990), 7.
11 See, e.g., Norman A. Stillman, The Jews of Arab Lands in Modern Times
(Philadelphia, 1991), 3–26.
12 For communal life, organization, and leadership, see Bat-Zion Eraqi
Klorman, Yehudei teman: Historyah, hevrah, tarbut, 3 vols. (Raanana,
2004), 2: 68–89.
13 See Bat-Zion Eraqi Klorman, “Haskalah, yahadut ve-Islam: Hebetim
hevratiyim ve-tarbutiyim,” in Kanaut datit, ed. Meir Litvak and Ora
Limor ( Jerusalem, 2007), 133–80.
14 On a tribal war caused by the robbery of a protected Jew, see Hayyim
Habshush, Masot habshush, ed. S. D. Goitein (Tel Aviv, 1939), 51–52.
15 Deshen, Mellah Society, 21; Daniel Schroeter, “Trade as a Mediator in
Muslim-Jewish Relations: Southwestern Morocco in the Nineteenth
Century,” in Jews Among Arabs: Contacts and Boundaries, ed. Mark R.
Cohen and Abraham L. Udovitch (Princeton, 1989), 113–40, esp. 124–
25. For Libya, see Harvey Goldberg, Mordecai Ha-Cohen: Higid Mordecai
( Jerusalem, 1978), 45, and Goldberg, Jewish Life in Muslim Libya, 12, 81.
16 Dresch, Tribes, 118–23. In twentieth-century Sanaa, “Yahudi” ( Jew) was
a derogatory name for a Muslim. A. Shivtiel, Wilfred Lockwood, and R.
B. Serjeant, “The Jews of San‘a’,” in San‘a’: An Arabian Islamic City, ed. R.
B. Serjeant and Ronald Lewcock (London, 1983), 391–431, esp. 422. In
other places, after uttering the word “Jew,” Muslims would apologize as
they would when saying something unpleasant; see R. B. Serjeant, Cus-
tomary and Shari‘ah Law in Arabian Society (Hampshire, 1991), 122.
17 S. D. Goitein, “Al ha-hayim ha-tsiburiyim shel ha-yehudim be-erets
teman,” in Ha-temanim: Historyah, sidrei hevrah, hayei ruah, ed. Menahem
Ben Sasson ( Jerusalem, 1983), 199–215, esp. 201–2; Serjeant, Custom-
ary and Shari‘ah Law, 120; Yosef Qafih, Halikhot teman ( Jerusalem,
1978), 227; Bat-Zion Eraqi Klorman, “Yehudei ha-kfarim ba-hevrah
uva-kalkalah shel teman,” Tehudah 15 (1995): 41–46, esp. 44; Carmela
Abdar, “Ha-mivneh ha-miktsoi shel toshvei Surm al-’Awd ke-vituy le-
mamado veha-tahalikhim she-avru alav,” in Le-Rosh Yosef, ed. Yosef Tobi
( Jerusalem, 1995), 481–502, esp. 493.
18 S. D. Goitein describes Jewish and Muslim relations in Yemen as “a very
tight symbiosis”; see his “Dyokano shel kfar orgim temani,” in Ben Sas-
son, Ha-temanim, 216–40, esp. 229. [111]
19 Occasionally the government supplied the Jews with some food. For ex-
ample, following the 1943 famine, Imam Yahya appropriated grain for Jews Converting
the Muslims of Sanaa as well as for the poor Jews. It was sold to them to Islam
below the very high market price. See the anonymous letter from Sanaa •
to Israel Yesha’yahu, May 11, 1943, Central Zionist Archives, S6 3802. Bat-Zion Eraqi
20 About famine, plagues, and Jewish conversions to Islam in 1724 and Klorman
1725, see Qorah, Searat teman, 15. Sadi, “Dofi ha-zman,” 205, describes
Jewish Islamization in 1724 as a large-scale phenomenon in Sanaa and
in the rural districts. See also Tobi, “Hitaslemut be-kerev yehudei
teman,” 114.
21 The letter was published in Yehuda Ratzaby, “Le-toldot yehudei teman:
Olelot historiyot,” Peamim 72 (1997): 106–23, esp. 112–13; the exact
date of the letter was not noted.
22 Yehuda Ratzaby, “Ba-masor u-va-masok,” in his Boi teman (Tel Aviv,
1967), 67–102, esp. 69.
23 Zilberberg, “Kitsur dvarim meha-sihah shel hanhalat ha-mahlaka im
A. Nissim, ba-kohenu be-aden she-nitkaymah be-yom 1.4.1945,” Cen-
tral Zionist Archives, S6 3803. (Unless otherwise indicated, all transla-
tions from foreign-language sources are mine.) For more about
Islamization caused by hunger, see Tobi, “Ha-kehilah ha-yehudit be-
teman,” 65–117, esp. 80, 97.
24 This is in contrast to the Islamization of lower-class dhimmis in Syria
and Palestine for the purpose of avoiding payment of the jizya. See
Nehemia Levtzion, “Conversions to Islam in Syria and Palestine,” in
Conversion and Continuity, ed. Michael Gerves and Ramzi Jibran Bikhazi
(Toronto, 1990), 289–311, esp. 298.
25 Depending on place and time, Jews paid the jizya to the tribal sheikhs,
to the imam, or to the Ottomans. In the tribal areas, tax payment
meant, at times, participation in public projects such as clearing roads
leading to the village or building a catch basin for water. During the
first half of the twentieth century, Jewish taxpayers (i.e., males aged
between about 13 and 60) in the imam-controlled areas were required
to pay the following annually: the rich, 3–4 reals; the middle class, 2
reals; and the poor, 1 real. During the 1940s, the average wage for a few
working days was 1 real. The jizya payment therefore equaled the earn-
ings of a few working days and was estimated at one dollar or a dollar
and a half per year. See the discussion about the jizya and documents
related to its collection in Shalom Gamliel, Pikudei teman ( Jerusalem,
1982). See also Serjeant, Customary and Shari‘ah Law, 118, and Tudor
Parfitt, The Road to Redemption: The Jews of Yemen, 1900–1950 (Leiden,
1996), 104–5.
26 Nehemia Levtzion, “Toward a Comparative Study of Islamization,” in
Conversion to Islam, ed. N. Levtzion (New York, 1979), 1–23, esp. 9; Ber-
 nard Lewis, The Jews of Islam (London, 1984), 95. Lieut.-Colonel H. F.
Jacob, “The Jews in the Yemen,” The Jewish Chronicle Supplement 29 (Apr.
[112] 1932), specifically discussed Jewish men in Sanaa who converted in
order to better their social standing. Regarding the Islamization of a
Jewish silversmith in the southern district of Hugariyya, see Ephraim
Jewish
Yaakov, ed., Temana: Mavo le-erets al-hugariyy (Nahariya, 1995), 136–39.
Social
See also Parfitt, Road to Redemption, 71 n. 19.
Studies 27 Mordechai Yishari, Hayiti ben aruba be-teman (Rosh Ha-ayin, 1989),
• 213–20.
Vol. 14 28 Nissim Ashri, interview, May 1994.
No. 1 29 Shalom Qahta, interview, Oct. 1994.
30 Gamlieli, interview, June 1994, and Gamlieli, Ahavat teman, 244. Other
examples include a Jew from the Hatuka family who lived in the Rada
district and who converted in the 1940s “because of poverty.” He
wished that his only daughter, eight years of age, would convert as well.
The rabbi of Rada, however, quickly married her as a second wife to an
older man, thus proving that she was of age and should not follow her
father. Sivya Yahya, interview, July 1994. And in the northern town of
Sa’da, three young men of the Hala family converted in the 1940s. Yair
Madar-Halevi, “The Relations between Jews and Muslims” (1982, man-
uscript), Bet Nehama ve-Yair Archives, Rehovot.
31 Shari‘a does not require the conversion of dhimmi women when mar-
ried to Muslims; however, the majority converted. On this phenom-
enon in the Ottoman Empire, see Lea Bornstein-Makovetsky,
“Hitaslemut ba-khilot ha-osmaniyot ve-hitnatsrut be-Italyah uve-ger-
maniah ba-meot ha-16 ve-ha-17,” Peamim 57 (1993): 29–47, esp. 35; in
Yemen, all Jewish women who married Muslims converted.
32 See Goldberg, Jewish Life in Muslim Libya, 75, about Jewish peddlers in
Libya who were allowed to enter Muslim homes and have direct contact
with the women of the household.
33 His children remained with his Jewish wife, whom he divorced when
she wanted to immigrate to Israel. Rason Halevi, Me-olam le-olam (Tel
Aviv, 2002), 288–91. For more about Jewish men who Islamized after
falling in love with Muslim women, see Zecharya ben ‘Awad al-’Adani,
quoted in Tobi, “Ha-kehilah ha-yehudit be-teman,” 84.
34 Two documents related to this story were published in Shalom Gamliel,
Ha-yehudim veha-melekh, vol. 1 ( Jerusalem, 1986), 409–15.
35 For example, Saida Sulayman and her husband immigrated to Israel in
1993. They left two daughters in Yemen, both married to Muslims.
Their third daughter married a Jew in Israel. Naftali Hilger, “Boi
teman,” Yediot aharonot, Feb. 13, 1998. This is seemingly a version of the
same case reported by Galya Zeevi, “Ha-masa sheli le-teman,” Tehudah
19 (1999): 121–26, esp. 125–26. Hilger traveled to Yemen in 1998 ac-
companied by young Yemeni Jews who immigrated to Israel in the
1990s. Some of the Jews they met in Yemen said that they were reluc-
tant to go to Israel because of its abundant temptations for religious
 people. The young visitors replied: “Are there not Jews here who were
seen on the Sabbath in cars? Did not girls and boys Islamize here?” Hil-
ger, “Boi teman.” [113]
36 Gamlieli, Ahavat teman, 226.
37 Three of these songs were published in ibid., 227. Jews Converting
38 Shalom Benei Moshe, “Dangerous Love,” in manuscript (ca. 1990), and to Islam
in an interview with the author, Sept. 1995. Benei Moshe emphasized •
specifically that the woman was exceptionally beautiful and stated that Bat-Zion Eraqi
the story was told to him by the couple, who lived in the Israeli town of Klorman
Rosh Ha-ayyin. They had six children and about fifty grandchildren.
39 Nissim Binyamin Gamlieli, Hevyon teman (Ramla, 1983), 86.
40 Seadia Shaar, quoted in Tobi, “Ha-kehilah ha-yehudit be-teman,” 101.
41 Benei Moshe, Ba-mesilah naaleh, 73–87.
42 Khursan Madhala, Sefer toldot mishpahat madhala (Rehovot, 1983),
99–100.
43 Ibid., 98.
44 Information given by Shalom Lahav (the son of Yahya Hilba) in Kehilat
yehudei bayhan (Netanya, 1996), 132–37. In 1996, Shalom Lahav, now
living in Israel, searched for and found his Muslim half brother.
45 This phenomenon is noted in Shemuel Yavneeli, Masa le-teman (Tel
Aviv, 1952), 50. See also Isaac Holander, “Ibra’ in Highland Yemen:
Two Jewish Divorce Settlements,” Islamic Law and Society 2, no. 1 (1995):
1–23, esp. 7.
46 Sivya Yahya, interview, July 1994. Habiba Sanani converted with her
daughter while her son remained with his father. In 1949, with the
mass emigration of the Jews from Yemen, she fled to Aden, returned to
Judaism, and immigrated to Israel. Her daughter remained in Yemen
because she was married to a Muslim.
47 Nissim Binyamin Gamlieli, Teman u-mahaneh geulah (Tel Aviv, 1966),
106. This story is also repeated in Benei Moshe, Ba-mesilah naaleh,
100–101.
48 Yehiel Habshush, Sheerit ha-pletah mi-teman (Tel Aviv, 1990), 128.
49 Neomi Cohen, interview, Mar. 1997. Wala Mahadun later married a
Jewish man from Barat. In 1942, they immigrated to Palestine and set-
tled in Rehovot, where she lived until her death in 1989.
50 Heftziba Hilger, “Four Personal Stories,” in Bat teman, ed. Shalom Seri
(Tel Aviv, 1993), 386–87. Aharon Ben-David, “‘Al aliyatam shel yehudei
Sada veha-svivah le-erets Yisrael bi-shnat 1951,” Tehudah 19 (1999): 74–
81, esp. 77, tells about a Jewish woman fighting with her husband while
traveling with her family to Aden on the way to Israel (in 1951). The
woman refused to climb into a pickup truck with her husband and
threatened that she would Islamize if forced to do so.
51 Lewis, Jews of Islam, 95–96; Bornstein-Makovetsky, “Hitaslemut,” 29–47,
esp. 33–34 and nn. 15, 16. See also the story above about Yosef Halevi,
who was offered freedom if he Islamized.
52 About Yosef al-Shaykh Levi and the circumstances of his conversion,
 see Bat-Zion Eraqi Klorman, The Jews of Yemen in the Nineteenth Century:
A Portrait of a Messianic Community (Leiden, 1993), 94–95.
[114] 53 The heads of the Jewish community’s petition to the Ottoman gover-
nor helped to ensure that the youth would not Islamize. He was guided
to say in public that he did not wish to convert; thus, the Muslim schol-
Jewish
ars ruled that he should not be forced to Islamize. See David Qaraso,
Social
“Zikhron teman,” translated into Hebrew by Y. R. Molkho, in Yehudei
Studies teman ba-meah ha-esrim: Toldot u-mekorot, ed. Y. Tobi (Tel Aviv, 1976),
• 121–90, esp. 163–65. Qaraso adds that any Jewish prisoner who stated
Vol. 14 his wish to convert was released from prison.
No. 1 54 Goitein, “Dyokano shel kfar orgim temani,” 230.
55 Yosef Dahuh-Halevi, interview, Apr. 2002.
56 Imam Ahmad (r. 1948–62) opposed such conversions; see Goitein,
“Dyokano shel kfar orgim temani,” 230.
57 For Jewish men who Islamized and remained in Yemen, see Reuben
Ahroni, “Addressing the Plight of the Yemeni ‘Agunot,” in Be-derekh lo
slulah: Ovadia ben shalom—mishol hayim u-mifal hayim, ed. A. Mizrahi
(Netanya, 2000), 267–77. Serjeant, who visited Habban in Dec. 1947,
wrote that after his visit most of the Habbani Jews immigrated to Israel
but some remained and Islamized; see Serjeant, Customary and Shari‘ah
Law, 120–21.
58 After 1973, Yehiel Mabari called on the Israeli government to help him
bring his mother and her family to Israel. However, she passed away in
Yemen in 1986. See the correspondence relating to this matter in Bet
Nehama ve-Yair Archives, no. 43.
59 Yair Madar-Halevi, “Naarah she-husharah al yedei aviha be-teman,”
Bet Nehama ve-Yair Archives, Shaarayim File.
60 Lahav, Kehilat yehudei bayhan, 124.
61 The efforts of the boy’s Jewish relatives to contact him succeeded when
they met him in 1995. The story and the efforts to locate ‘Abdalla al-
Muslimani were told by his cousin to Shalom Lahav (Kehilat yehudei bay-
han, 120–31). The story was published again in Lahav, “Yeladim
she-uslemu be-teman.”
62 Zadoc ‘Umaysi, interview, Oct. 1994.
63 This act was also performed in the case of the Islamization of minor
orphans. But the orphan was not asked to pronounce the shahada.
Being an orphan, he was not perceived as yet educated in the religion
of his parents and therefore did not have to “convert.” See Eraqi Klor-
man, “Forced Conversion of Jewish Orphans,” 84.
64 See Ratzaby, Be-maaglot teman, 231; Holander, “Ibra’ in Highland
Yemen,” 1.
65 This refers mainly to samna (clarified butter), an essential ingredient of
the Yemeni kitchen that was eaten with bread. About Jews eating in
tribesmen’s homes, see, e.g., Benei Moshe, Ba-mesilah naaleh, 86–87;
Moshe Libi, Bi-ntivot mosheh, ed. Aharon Ben David (Qiryat ‘Eqron,
 2004), 67; Abraham Madhala, Ein li erets aheret (Tel Aviv, 1997), 34; and
Eraqi Klorman, Yehudei teman, 2: 47–48.
66 For the eating in public of meat soup by the Jewish convert, see Benei [115]
Moshe, Ba-mesilah naaleh, 86. For this act as a final proof of conversion,
see ibid., 90. Regarding a youth who was forcibly fed meat soup by Mus- Jews Converting
lims and believed that he had Islamized, see Gamliel, Ha-yehudim veha- to Islam
melekh, 399, 402–3. For a folk tale that explains the Islamization of the •
Jews in the village of al-Salaf as a result of their eating nonkosher meat, Bat-Zion Eraqi
see Nissim Binyamin Gamlieli, Hadrei teman: Sipurim ve-agadot (Tel Aviv, Klorman
1978), 207; another version of this tale can be found in Gamlieli,
Hevyon teman, 85–86.
67 For Jews who Islamized and then returned to Judaism and were pun-
ished by the Jewish court with 40 lashes, see Tobi, “Ha-kehilah ha-yehu-
dit be-teman,” 80.
68 Aharon Eraqi, interview, Feb. 1996, as told to him by his father, Shlomo
Eraqi of al-Hajar.
69 Gamlieli, Teman ba-teudot, 47–48; Yehuda Ratzaby, “Yehudim be-teman
be-arkaot shel goyim: 11 shtarot hadashim (1864–1950),” Mi-mizrah umi-
maarav 6 (1995): 97–130, esp. 123; Gamliel, Ha-yehudim veha-melekh, 392.
Gamlieli, Hevyon teman, 87, mentions the name ‘Abd al-Rahman al-
Muhtadi; Gamliel, Pikudei teman, 97, indicates the name ‘Ali Salih Isma’il
al-Muhtadi; in Ahroni, “Addressing the Plight of the Yemeni ‘Agunot,”
271, a Jewish convert was named ‘Abd al-Malik Ibn Nasir Husayn; Shivtiel
et al., “The Jews of San‘a,” 422, writes that in Bayhan, in addition to al-
Muhtadi, the name al-Muslimani was known for Jewish families who had
converted in earlier generations. In places other than Yemen, the convert
also received the family name of al-Muhtadi. Sometimes the preferable
name was Muhammad. See Amnon Cohen, Jewish Life Under Islam: Jerusa-
lem in the Sixteenth Century (Cambridge, Mass., 1984), 127.
70 Gamlieli, Teman ba-teudot, 49; Benei Moshe, Ba-mesilah naaleh, 86; Nis-
sim ‘Ashri, interview, May 1994. For descriptions of the conversion cer-
emony, see also Yishari, Hayiti ben aruba, 220; Tobi, “Ha-kehilah
ha-yehudit be-teman,” 68, 97; and Ratzaby, Be-maaglot teman, 234. Benei
Moshe, Ba-mesilah naaleh, 87, summarizes the conversion steps in his
view: “[C]utting the side locks as well as putting on the headdress,
wearing the dagger, riding a horse, and eating animals not slaughtered
ritually, symbolize the exit from the Jewish religion and the entrance
to the Muslim religion.”
71 See Shivtiel, “The Jews of San‘a,” 422.
72 See Madhala, Sefer, 100, regarding a Jewish convert in northern Yemen.
See also Yishari, Hayiti ben aruba, 220.
73 Ibid. See also the story mentioned above about the Jewish youth who
converted and was made a soldier (Gamlieli, interview, June 1994).
74 Yosef Tobi, “Horaat bet din Sana be-inyan yehudi she-hemir et dato
(1887),” in his Moreshet yehudei teman, 111–14.
75 Madhala, Sefer, 98–99.
 76 Ibid., 100.
77 Gamliel, Ha-yehudim veha-melekh, 409–15. In 1941, Imam Yahya re-
[116] turned 12-year-old Yosef to his parents after the governor of al-Raydah
had taken the boy in and fed him meat soup—turning the boy, so to
speak, into a Muslim. The imam ruled that the governor acted unlaw-
Jewish
fully, since the boy was not an orphan. Ibid, 399–408.
Social
78 Gamlieli, Teman ba-teudot, 49–50; Tobi, “Ha-kehilah ha-yehudit be-
Studies teman,” 97.
• 79 Gamliel, Ha-yehudim veha-melekh, 392, 404; Gamlieli, Teman ba-teudot,
Vol. 14 49; Ratzaby, Be-maaglot teman, 234.
No. 1 80 Gamlieli, Teman u-mahaneh geulah, 70.
81 Gamlieli, Teman ba-teudot, 50 n. 4.
82 Thomas B. Stevenson, Social Change in a Yemeni Highland Town (Salt
Lake City, Utah, 1985), 44.
83 Ratzaby, Be-maaglot teman, 234.
84 Quoted from Zcharia Dori, “Yatmut u-ndod—shmad ve-hasala—aliyat
ha-yetomim be-mivtsa al kanfei nesharim,” Tehudah 19 (1999): 25–31,
esp. 26, in spite of the fact that he was referring to minor Jewish or-
phans who did not choose their conversion.
85 Gamlieli, Teman u-mahaneh geulah, 70.
86 According to Muslim law, the marriage of a woman who converted to
Islam and her husband who did not is irrevocably annulled. See Fried-
mann, Tolerance and Coercion in Islam, 164–66.
87 Gamlieli, Teman u-mahaneh geulah, 106.
88 Madhala, Sefer, 98.
89 Gamliel, Ha-yehudim veha-melekh, 392–98.
90 Halevi, Me-olam, 291–92.
91 See Jacob Katz, Bein yehudim le-goyim ( Jerusalem, 1977), 76. For the hal-
akhah’s perspective toward the convert and his descendants, see Mi-
chael Corinaldi, Hidat ha-zehut ha-yehudit ( Jerusalem, 2001), 107–13.
92 Tobi, “Ha-kehilah ha-yehudit be-teman,” 80.
93 Goitein, “Dyokano shel kfar orgim temani,” 230.
94 Gamlieli, Ahavat teman, 244; Gamlieli, interview, June 1994.
95 Gamlieli, Ahavat teman, 244.
96 He contacted Jewish acquaintances who encouraged him and helped
him to cross the border to Aden. See Yishari, Hayiti ben aruba, 221–37.
97 Dahuh-Halevi, interview, Apr. 2002. For more Jewish converts who re-
turned to Judaism and immigrated to Israel, see Tobi, “Ha-kehilah ha-
yehudit be-teman,” 90, 97.
98 For problems related to the division of property in cases of inheritance
or divorce when one of the parties Islamized, see Nahshon, “Ha-han-
hagah ha-yehudit be-teman,” 175.
99 See, e.g., Madhala, Sefer, 99. Ahroni, “Addressing the Plight of the Ye-
meni ‘Agunot,” 267, writes about a woman who immigrated to Israel in
1950 while her husband remained in Yemen and kept their two infants.
 Madar-Halevi, “Naarah she-husharah,” writes about a woman who Is-
lamized in 1949 and took her two children with her.
100 Yehuda Ratzaby, “Maasei bet din sana ba-meah ha-18,” Mi-mizrah umi- [117]
maarav 4 (1983): 79–109, esp. 88. ‘Umaysi (interview, Oct. 1994) told
about a Jew from Rada who Islamized in the first half of the twentieth Jews Converting
century and deserted his wife. One Friday the Jews came to the mosque to Islam
and asked the Muslim notables: “Is this person a Jew or a Muslim?” •
They answered: “He is a Muslim.” The Jews asked: “If this is the case, Bat-Zion Eraqi
why does he have a Jewish woman?” They asked that the convert give Klorman
his wife a divorce. The Muslim notables said that they did not have any
objection, and the convert signed the get. About a Jew who Islamized in
1942 and agreed to divorce his wife who refused to convert with him,
see Laurence D. Loeb, “Gender, Marriage, and Social Conflict in Hab-
ban,” in Sephardi and Middle Eastern Jewries: History and Culture in the
Modern Era, ed. Harvey E. Goldberg (Bloomington, Ind., 1996), 259–
76, esp. 271.
101 About women who were deserted following the conversion of husbands or
brothers-in-law in medieval Jewish society, see Katz, Bein yehudim, 77–78.
102 For the legal deliberation concerning the effort to release a young
woman whose husband Islamized and disappeared when she immi-
grated to Israel in 1950, see Shlomo Siyani, Orhot shlomoh (Bnei Braq,
1992), and Ahroni, “Addressing the Plight of the Yemeni ‘Agunot.”
103 Yemeni rabbis ruled in accordance with Jewish law that requires halit-
sah from a converted yavam. In very few such cases did they permit the
release of the widow without halitsah. See Gaimani, “Ha-yibum be-
kerev benei teman,” 104–5, nn. 95, 96.
104 Qaraso, “Zikhron teman,” 163. About Qaraso himself, see ibid., 122–
23. Seemingly there were whole villages that Islamized. These were
probably the al-Muhtadiyin (reference to a Jewish past) villages in the
Ashar district that might have Islamized as the result of a catastrophic
event. They engaged in weaving, which was a typical Jewish trade. See
Gamlieli, Teman u-mahaneh geulah, 70.
105 Nehemia Levtzion, “Conversions and Islamization in the Middle Ages:
How Did the Jews and Christians Differ?” Peamim 42 (1990): 8–15, esp.
10; Nehemia Levtzion, “Toward a Comparative Study of Islamization,”
in Conversion to Islam, ed. N. Levtzion (New York, 1979), 1–23, esp. 9.
See also Richard Bulliet, “Conversion Stories in Early Islam,” in Conver-
sion and Continuity, ed. Michael Gervers and Ramzi Jibran Bikhazi (To-
ronto, 1990), 123–33.
106 Tobi, “Hitaslemut be-kerev yehudei teman”; Ratzaby, Be-maaglot teman;
Gaimani, “Ha-yibum be-kerev benei teman.”
107 For the conversion of Jews in Muslim lands in medieval times, see
Lewis, Jews of Islam, 95–102. On conversions in medieval times in the
geniza documents, see S. D. Goitein, A Mediterranean Society, vol. 2
(Berkeley, 1971), 299–311. For the conversion of Jews in Ottoman Jeru-
salem, see A. Cohen, Jewish Life Under Islam, 74–76, and Amnon Cohen
 and Elisheva Simon-Pikali, Jews in the Moslem Religious Court: Society,
Economy and Communal Organization in the 16th Century Documents from
[118] Ottoman Jerusalem ( Jerusalem, 1993), 127–30. For more on Jewish Is-
lamization in the Ottoman Empire, see Bornstein-Makovetsky, “Hitasl-
emut,” 29–47; Zvi Zohar, Masoret u-tmurah: Hitmodedut hakhmei yisrael
Jewish
be-mitsrayim u-ve-Suryah im etgarei ha-modernizatsyah 1880–1920 ( Jerusa-
Social
lem, 1993), 187–93; and Nissim Kazzaz, “Hamarot dat be-kerev yehudei
Studies Iraq ba-et ha-hadashah,” Peamim 42 (1990): 157–66.
• 108 See Maimonides’ attitude toward Islam and Christianity in Amos
Vol. 14 Funkenstein, “Tfisato ha-historit veha-meshihit shel ha-rambam,” Tad-
No. 1 mit ve-todaah historit (Tel Aviv, 1991), 103–56, esp. 139–42, and Amos
Funkenstein, “Political Theory and Realistic Messianism,” Miscellanaea
Mediaevalia 11 (1970): 81–103. See also Eliezer Schlossberg, “Yahaso
shel ha-rambam el ha-islam,” Peamim 42 (1990): 38–60. Regarding the
absence of absolute rejection of Islam’s values, see Menahem Ben-
Sasson, “Le-zehutam ha-yehudit shel anusim: Iyun be-hishtamdut bi-
tekufat ha-almuwahidun,” Peamim 42 (1990): 16–36, esp. 20. About Jews
in Jerba, Tunisia, showing religious empathy toward their Muslim
neighbors and saying that they are true monotheists and have “descent
laws,” see Shlomo Deshen, “Yehudei drom Tunisyah: Tsarfatyut, arvi-
yut, yahadut,” Zmanim 82 (2003): 4–15, esp. 11.
109 See Mark R. Cohen, “Ha-Islam veha-yehudim: Mitos, mitos negdi, his-
toria,” in Sofrim muslemim al yehudim ve-yahadut, ed. Hava Lazarus-Yafeh
( Jerusalem, 1996), 21–36, esp. 34–35. For the Jews’ attitude toward
Christianity, see Y. Yuval, “Ha-nakam veha-klalah, ha-dam ve-ha-ali-
lah,” Zion 58, no. 1 (1993): 33–90.
110 Sadi, “Dofi ha-zman,” 87.
111 See Sara Stroumsa, “Al intelektualim yehudim mumarim bi-ymei ha-
benayim ha-muqdamim tahat shilton ha-Islam,” Peamim 42 (1990): 61–75.
112 Nevertheless, Rabbi Yahya Qafih and Hayyim Habshush, leading
maskilim in Sanaa at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of
the twentieth centuries, were interested in Islamic lore and read Is-
lamic history books and legal literature in Arabic. Habshush even con-
ducted dialogues with Muslim scholars on these matters, but their
content was not registered. See Eraqi Klorman, “Haskalah, yahadut
ve-Islam.”
113 Ratzaby, Be-maaglot teman, 231; Holander, “Ibra’ in Highland Yemen,” 1.