Jewish Thought in Fez in the Generations following the Spanish Expulsion: Characteristics, Style, and Content

Abstract:After the Spanish expulsion, the Jewish exiles sought refuge in the Ottoman Empire, Western Europe, and North Africa. Among the North African countries, Morocco harbored the largest number of refugees, many of them settled in Fez. The arrival of the Spanish exiles introduced a new wave of intellectual activity to the local Jewish community in Fez. While previous studies have shown their contribution in the fields of halakhah, poetry, and historiography, this paper demonstrates that a new chapter began in the realm of Jewish thought as well. The works composed by the exiles who settled in Fez were diverse, comprised of the literary genres that had once proliferated in Spain, mostly sermons and commentary. A review of their writings reveals that they were preoccupied with the central theological subjects discussed in the Middle Ages, yet they did not compose their own original philosophical or theological works. They were heavily influenced by the writings of earlier and contemporary Sephardic thinkers; it appears that it was philosophy and astrology in their moderate version that had shaped their worldview. At the same time, they had a strong affinity for ancient rabbinical aggadah, and likewise to the zoharic and kabbalistic literature. Sephardic Jewish thought tradition continued to exist after the expulsion, not only in the Ottoman Diaspora and European Sephardic communities, as is has been claimed in previous research, but in Morocco as well.