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The Jews of Islam
Probing the Muslims' attitude toward Judaism as a special case of their view of other religious minorities in Islamic countries, Bernard Lewis demolishes two competing stereotypes: the fanatical warrior, sword in one hand and Qur' an in the other, and the Muslim designer of an interfaith utopia. Available for the first time in paperback, his portrayal of the Judaeo-Islamic tradition is set against a vivid background of Jewish and Islamic history.
280 pages, Paperback
First published December 31, 1983
About the author
Bernard Lewis
153 books454 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.
Bernard Lewis was the Cleveland E. Dodge Professor of Near Eastern Studies Emeritus at Princeton University and the author of many critially acclaimed and bestselling books, including two number one New York Times bestsellers: What Went Wrong? and Crisis of Islam. The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2,000 Years was a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. Internationally recognized as the greatest historian of the Middle East, he received fifteen honorary doctorates and his books have been translated into more than twenty languages.
Bernard Lewis was the Cleveland E. Dodge Professor of Near Eastern Studies Emeritus at Princeton University and the author of many critially acclaimed and bestselling books, including two number one New York Times bestsellers: What Went Wrong? and Crisis of Islam. The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2,000 Years was a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. Internationally recognized as the greatest historian of the Middle East, he received fifteen honorary doctorates and his books have been translated into more than twenty languages.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
May 29, 2019
Due to his later political views, Bernard Lewis has developed a rather toxic reputation among many students of the Middle East. This is a shame, because much of his earlier scholarship is not just erudite but even brilliant. This book is Lewis’s account of the now defunct Judeo-Islamic tradition and the long history of Jewish life under Muslim rule. The Judeo-Islamic tradition Lewis describes was much longer and more extensive than the Judeo-Christian idea recently promoted by the pundit Ben Shapiro among others. It was also less of an ideologically specious concept. As such this book, by a very conservative Zionist historian no less, almost serves as a rebuttal to what passes for popular knowledge about Jewish-Muslim history today.
The position of Jews in Muslim countries was never exemplary and is certainly no model for us today. But for many centuries Muslim empires were places where Jews had the greatest opportunity to live with security and prosperity. At times they even allowed them to flourish. Under the terms of the dhimma, Jews and other minorities were prohibited from rising above a certain level in society but were equally prohibited from declining below it. The protection of their basic rights was a religious requirement, part of the preservation of an overall God-given hierarchy in which they were protected but ultimately subordinate to the ruling Muslims. Fleeing persecution in other lands, Jews often exhorted their coreligionists to live under Islamic polities. While seldom honored under Muslim rule, they were rarely persecuted and sometimes even respected for their talents.
By medieval standards, from the Jewish perspective, the dhimma arrangement was quite appealing. It was certainly better than conditions in Europe at the time, in which they had no guarantee of any protection and where popular antagonism against them had a terrifyingly cosmic basis. The animosity towards Jews in Muslim countries was based on the more banal contempt of the powerful for the subordinate, Lewis writes. He repeatedly argues that the anti-Semitism that existed in Muslim lands generally came from Christian minorities, for whom the Jews were theological and sometimes economic rivals. Persecution of Jews was never considered a religious imperative by Muslim populations. Disturbing demands by certain ulema for the dhimma requirments to be imposed with humiliation were mostly ignored by Muslim rulers.
Perhaps due to his background as an expert on Turkey, Lewis is something of an apologist for the Ottoman Empire. His description of Ottoman patronage of Jewish communities is quite positive. By contrast Jews had it much harder in Iran and Morocco, where both the local population and the ruling authorities were less well disposed. Some of the descriptions of their treatment and degradation over the years are harrowing. I hope that his positive appraisal of Jewish life in the Ottoman Empire compared to other places is partly due to his lack of expertise in those lands compared with his deep knowledge of Turkey. Sadly, though, the treatment of minorities was rarely ever good in premodernity. I see no reason to doubt that it was as bad as he described for Jews in the medieval Muslim periphery.
Some of the most interesting passages deal with the influence of Islam on Jewish theology, a field which came into existence under Islamic influence. The Hebrew language was deeply influenced by Arabic and some of Judaism’s most important thinkers (Maimonides being the most towering example) had their worldview shaped within an Islamic milieu. With the European Enlightenment came the idea of the universal equality of mankind, which made a profound impression on minorities around the world. In Muslim lands, the traditional dhimma system began to look less palatable to Jews and Christians alike.
Coupled with the political decline of Muslim states, life for everyone — but first of all for minorities — began to become less tolerable. Christians were historically tied to European Christendom, though until the liberal era Jews had no such European friends. In the 20th century, Jewish communities that had been seen as tied to the new liberal European powers collapsed. Most fled to the West or to the new state of Israel. Lewis contextualizes this end of the Judeo-Islamic tradition within that broader political context. He says little about the Israel-Palestine conflict, though he concedes that it played some role. Today the Judeo-Islamic tradition is over, though academic interest in it remains. There has also been a notable increase in popular interest in the subject lately in the Arab Middle East.
I found this book to be a nuanced and scholarly treatment of this subject. Maybe standards have changed, but compared to today’s anti-Islamic invective one could almost consider Lewis an Islamophile based on such works. He seemed to have been infected with the common ailment of speaking in a less thoughtful way than in which he wrote, which seems to have undermined his legacy. This book was certainly more interesting than Martin Gilbert's treatment of the same subject. It also benefits from brevity and Lewis's gifted prose. I hope that an honest accounting of Muslim-Jewish history can open the door to a more constructive future.
The position of Jews in Muslim countries was never exemplary and is certainly no model for us today. But for many centuries Muslim empires were places where Jews had the greatest opportunity to live with security and prosperity. At times they even allowed them to flourish. Under the terms of the dhimma, Jews and other minorities were prohibited from rising above a certain level in society but were equally prohibited from declining below it. The protection of their basic rights was a religious requirement, part of the preservation of an overall God-given hierarchy in which they were protected but ultimately subordinate to the ruling Muslims. Fleeing persecution in other lands, Jews often exhorted their coreligionists to live under Islamic polities. While seldom honored under Muslim rule, they were rarely persecuted and sometimes even respected for their talents.
By medieval standards, from the Jewish perspective, the dhimma arrangement was quite appealing. It was certainly better than conditions in Europe at the time, in which they had no guarantee of any protection and where popular antagonism against them had a terrifyingly cosmic basis. The animosity towards Jews in Muslim countries was based on the more banal contempt of the powerful for the subordinate, Lewis writes. He repeatedly argues that the anti-Semitism that existed in Muslim lands generally came from Christian minorities, for whom the Jews were theological and sometimes economic rivals. Persecution of Jews was never considered a religious imperative by Muslim populations. Disturbing demands by certain ulema for the dhimma requirments to be imposed with humiliation were mostly ignored by Muslim rulers.
Perhaps due to his background as an expert on Turkey, Lewis is something of an apologist for the Ottoman Empire. His description of Ottoman patronage of Jewish communities is quite positive. By contrast Jews had it much harder in Iran and Morocco, where both the local population and the ruling authorities were less well disposed. Some of the descriptions of their treatment and degradation over the years are harrowing. I hope that his positive appraisal of Jewish life in the Ottoman Empire compared to other places is partly due to his lack of expertise in those lands compared with his deep knowledge of Turkey. Sadly, though, the treatment of minorities was rarely ever good in premodernity. I see no reason to doubt that it was as bad as he described for Jews in the medieval Muslim periphery.
Some of the most interesting passages deal with the influence of Islam on Jewish theology, a field which came into existence under Islamic influence. The Hebrew language was deeply influenced by Arabic and some of Judaism’s most important thinkers (Maimonides being the most towering example) had their worldview shaped within an Islamic milieu. With the European Enlightenment came the idea of the universal equality of mankind, which made a profound impression on minorities around the world. In Muslim lands, the traditional dhimma system began to look less palatable to Jews and Christians alike.
Coupled with the political decline of Muslim states, life for everyone — but first of all for minorities — began to become less tolerable. Christians were historically tied to European Christendom, though until the liberal era Jews had no such European friends. In the 20th century, Jewish communities that had been seen as tied to the new liberal European powers collapsed. Most fled to the West or to the new state of Israel. Lewis contextualizes this end of the Judeo-Islamic tradition within that broader political context. He says little about the Israel-Palestine conflict, though he concedes that it played some role. Today the Judeo-Islamic tradition is over, though academic interest in it remains. There has also been a notable increase in popular interest in the subject lately in the Arab Middle East.
I found this book to be a nuanced and scholarly treatment of this subject. Maybe standards have changed, but compared to today’s anti-Islamic invective one could almost consider Lewis an Islamophile based on such works. He seemed to have been infected with the common ailment of speaking in a less thoughtful way than in which he wrote, which seems to have undermined his legacy. This book was certainly more interesting than Martin Gilbert's treatment of the same subject. It also benefits from brevity and Lewis's gifted prose. I hope that an honest accounting of Muslim-Jewish history can open the door to a more constructive future.
October 1, 2015
This book profoundly troubled me. Bernard Lewis perfectly delineated the way Jews have been treated by Muslim societies. At best they were treated with contempt at worst they were subjected to the kind of treatment that blacks in South Africa experienced. What perturbed me was the fact that those who meted out such treatment did so in the name of Islam. Pious, and God fearing Caliphs like Ibn Umar who renounced worldly goods and who frugal lives had no qualms about subjecting Jews to such discrimination. People such as Irshad Manji have made a name for themselves by demonizing Islam and saying that Quran contains hateful passages about Jews.
This is not the case at all. The second Caliph Umar is described as having a very intolerant attitude towards Jews; in his view, the Jews opted not to choose the religion of Islam and as such were not worthy of consideration. The justification of this view is debatable. But in reading this book you have to bear in mind that the character of any religion can never be fully portrayed by the actions of its followers. It is also useful to note that however bad the treatment of Jews by Muslim it very often paled into insignificance when you consider how they were treated by the Christian empire. The example of Christ had as much impact on the prejudices of Christians as the the example of Muhammad (PBUH) on Muslims.
Anyone who wishes to find an answer for the shocking treatment of Muslims by Jews should not turn to the Quran but to a psychological experiment conducted in Stanford University in 1970. A mock prison was created in the basement of Stanford University.A group of volunteers were divided into prisoners and guards for two weeks. Within six days the prison guards became vicious and sadistic. Professor Zimbardo who led the experiment concluded that the majority of people can be seduced into behaving in a manner atypical of their beliefs.
I think you can apply that same reasoning to the way Jews were treated by Muslims. In any society where a group of people be they Muslims or Christians have dominance over another group of people; their human nature will inevitably compel them to acts of cruelty and sadism. Religion does not matter very much at all in this situation. Some of the rules and regulations set out by Muslims for the Jews described by Bernard Lewis would horrify most people today. 'If a Jew is struck in the face by a Muslim he must not retaliate but instead must keep his head down.' One particular Imam is described as saying: 'If you wash a negro 200 times you will not find any signs of whiteness so it is with the Jews...they will always be impure.' Truly shocking to think that such an attitude could have been the norm in any society.
The only fault with this book is that Bernard Lewis should have given more emphasis on the anti-Semitism of Muslims today. But all in all; a very concise and informative read.
This is not the case at all. The second Caliph Umar is described as having a very intolerant attitude towards Jews; in his view, the Jews opted not to choose the religion of Islam and as such were not worthy of consideration. The justification of this view is debatable. But in reading this book you have to bear in mind that the character of any religion can never be fully portrayed by the actions of its followers. It is also useful to note that however bad the treatment of Jews by Muslim it very often paled into insignificance when you consider how they were treated by the Christian empire. The example of Christ had as much impact on the prejudices of Christians as the the example of Muhammad (PBUH) on Muslims.
Anyone who wishes to find an answer for the shocking treatment of Muslims by Jews should not turn to the Quran but to a psychological experiment conducted in Stanford University in 1970. A mock prison was created in the basement of Stanford University.A group of volunteers were divided into prisoners and guards for two weeks. Within six days the prison guards became vicious and sadistic. Professor Zimbardo who led the experiment concluded that the majority of people can be seduced into behaving in a manner atypical of their beliefs.
I think you can apply that same reasoning to the way Jews were treated by Muslims. In any society where a group of people be they Muslims or Christians have dominance over another group of people; their human nature will inevitably compel them to acts of cruelty and sadism. Religion does not matter very much at all in this situation. Some of the rules and regulations set out by Muslims for the Jews described by Bernard Lewis would horrify most people today. 'If a Jew is struck in the face by a Muslim he must not retaliate but instead must keep his head down.' One particular Imam is described as saying: 'If you wash a negro 200 times you will not find any signs of whiteness so it is with the Jews...they will always be impure.' Truly shocking to think that such an attitude could have been the norm in any society.
The only fault with this book is that Bernard Lewis should have given more emphasis on the anti-Semitism of Muslims today. But all in all; a very concise and informative read.
October 23, 2011
This study covers Muslim attitudes toward Jews from the first days of Islam up to the 20th century. Sources include Jurist fatwas, Qur'an commentaries, literature, theological doctrines, and archival sources.
Muslim perception of the Jews changed over time and varied according to region and political conditions. It cannot broadly be categorized as an attitude either extraordinarily repressive or tolerant, although both extremes occurred.
Islamic scripture does not place non-believers on par with believers, and paints the Jews in a particularly harsh light. However, periodic hostility toward the Jews can be readily explained by historical factors without recourse to theology. Early Muslims tended to be more wary of Jews than they were of Christians, but as they increasingly came into conflict with Christians they became more friendly toward the Jews up to the Ottoman 16th century, a high point of tolerance.
Central Islamic lands such as Turkey, Egypt and the Levant were generally more tolerant than peripheral areas such as Iran and Morocco; however, Spain and the Hijaz were notable exceptions to this rule. Jews and Muslim often had a symbiotic relationship, exchanging theological ideas, scientific knowledge, and technological advances.
Muslim perception of the Jews changed over time and varied according to region and political conditions. It cannot broadly be categorized as an attitude either extraordinarily repressive or tolerant, although both extremes occurred.
Islamic scripture does not place non-believers on par with believers, and paints the Jews in a particularly harsh light. However, periodic hostility toward the Jews can be readily explained by historical factors without recourse to theology. Early Muslims tended to be more wary of Jews than they were of Christians, but as they increasingly came into conflict with Christians they became more friendly toward the Jews up to the Ottoman 16th century, a high point of tolerance.
Central Islamic lands such as Turkey, Egypt and the Levant were generally more tolerant than peripheral areas such as Iran and Morocco; however, Spain and the Hijaz were notable exceptions to this rule. Jews and Muslim often had a symbiotic relationship, exchanging theological ideas, scientific knowledge, and technological advances.
March 3, 2021
I read this book over the span of 2 days while writing a paper for my Islamic World course. The richness of the information captured by this book surprises me; for, it informed me of events, and nuances in the Muslim treatment of the Jewish peoples that I never knew myself. This is a read I definitely recommend for students of Islamic or Middle Eastern History, Theology, and Jewish History.
June 21, 2021
Pretty decent book about Jewish living and its influences under Islamic governments.
During much of the apogee of the Islamic world, Jews were just another dhimmi, a group of unbelievers who yet held a true but perverted form of revelation. As such, they should be kept to their place, under a series of measures design to humiliate and onerate them financially, without however forcing their conversion or submitting them to the same violence they suffered in Medieval and Modern Europe. At some points, even these measures were forgotten, especially at times of optimism and expansion in these regimes. Accordingly, Jews were allowed to prosper and sometimes even reach relevant positions of certain power. Sure enough, there were times of backlash occasionally however they were quickly reverted and the Jews returned to their status quo.
When the Islamic regimes saw themselves threatened, however, this protection reverted. Both Christians and Jews suffered, under the suspicion of being collaborationists of infidel states - a suspicion many times not unfounded. Nevertheless, as time passed and the Christian powers grew bolder, the Christian minorities in the Dar-al-Islam got more prosperous and educated, and the general prosperity of Jews took a nosedive, they saw themselves more constant victims of abuse and violence, until a point of abject poverty and humiliation reached between the 18th and 19th century.
This book comes to demystify the idea that Jewish life in the Islamic world was some kind of bed of roses before the advent of Zionism. Certainly, there were "Golden Ages" - such as the Ottoman 16th century and the Almoravid regime - however even in best times Jews were not allowed to ascend beyond the "status" of symbolic humiliation conferred by traditional Islamic thought. And during the worst times Jews were subject to violent oppression - specially outside of the heartlands of Islam, such as in Yemen, Morocco, Iran, and Afghanistan - forced conversions, pogroms, and blood libels.
It is interesting also to see how much of this strictly anti-semitic thought was brought by European influence and fanned by local Christian minorities. In fact even today Greeks and Armenians seem in general more anti-semitic than your regular Turk. Yet this is not to say that Muslim thought did not heavily contribute to the current state of affairs.
During much of the apogee of the Islamic world, Jews were just another dhimmi, a group of unbelievers who yet held a true but perverted form of revelation. As such, they should be kept to their place, under a series of measures design to humiliate and onerate them financially, without however forcing their conversion or submitting them to the same violence they suffered in Medieval and Modern Europe. At some points, even these measures were forgotten, especially at times of optimism and expansion in these regimes. Accordingly, Jews were allowed to prosper and sometimes even reach relevant positions of certain power. Sure enough, there were times of backlash occasionally however they were quickly reverted and the Jews returned to their status quo.
When the Islamic regimes saw themselves threatened, however, this protection reverted. Both Christians and Jews suffered, under the suspicion of being collaborationists of infidel states - a suspicion many times not unfounded. Nevertheless, as time passed and the Christian powers grew bolder, the Christian minorities in the Dar-al-Islam got more prosperous and educated, and the general prosperity of Jews took a nosedive, they saw themselves more constant victims of abuse and violence, until a point of abject poverty and humiliation reached between the 18th and 19th century.
This book comes to demystify the idea that Jewish life in the Islamic world was some kind of bed of roses before the advent of Zionism. Certainly, there were "Golden Ages" - such as the Ottoman 16th century and the Almoravid regime - however even in best times Jews were not allowed to ascend beyond the "status" of symbolic humiliation conferred by traditional Islamic thought. And during the worst times Jews were subject to violent oppression - specially outside of the heartlands of Islam, such as in Yemen, Morocco, Iran, and Afghanistan - forced conversions, pogroms, and blood libels.
It is interesting also to see how much of this strictly anti-semitic thought was brought by European influence and fanned by local Christian minorities. In fact even today Greeks and Armenians seem in general more anti-semitic than your regular Turk. Yet this is not to say that Muslim thought did not heavily contribute to the current state of affairs.
January 19, 2024
In this fantastic book written 40 years ago - Bernard Lewis effectively challenges two contrasting misconceptions about Islamic treatment of non-Muslims: zealous and violent, "wielding a sword in one hand and the Qur'an in the other", and the notion of the Muslim architect of a harmonious, multi-faith paradise with comparable multicultural efforts within Western liberal democracy.
Both are wrong. According to Lewis, every iota of the anti-semitism that encapsulates the Jewish experience within Christendom, from the polemicists and literature that excoriate them, to the mass expulsions and murders that threatened to extinguish them - are almost entirely absent from the Islamic world. There are cases of extreme persecution (e.g within the Almohad Caliphate and the Granada Massacre of 1066), but these are rarer incidents as compared to Christendom.
Nonetheless, Jews (and Christians), were subjugated, "protected people", (dhimmis), in both legal and social contexts. It should be noted that while Jews were "protected people", the intended Islamic injunction is to discern between polytheists (who were not recognized as dhimmis), and monotheists mislead by the unreliability of their texts. Most notably they faced distinct (and often greater) taxcodes, but were oblige to dress codes and several other limitations. Yet, because Judaism and Christianity were acknowledged as partially valid, believers were allocated a legally sanctioned role within the state, and at times of prosperity they even flourished. Contradistinctively, there were times of more negative, discriminatory attitudes by Muslims towards Jews.
Altogether I was positively struck by both the balance and sweeping period covered by this book. Unfortunately, Lewis would later become notorious for his attitudes towards Muslims. He became less the academic historian and more the ideological functionary. Nonetheless, this is a great example of an academic rendering of a thousand years of Jewish-Islamic history.
Both are wrong. According to Lewis, every iota of the anti-semitism that encapsulates the Jewish experience within Christendom, from the polemicists and literature that excoriate them, to the mass expulsions and murders that threatened to extinguish them - are almost entirely absent from the Islamic world. There are cases of extreme persecution (e.g within the Almohad Caliphate and the Granada Massacre of 1066), but these are rarer incidents as compared to Christendom.
Nonetheless, Jews (and Christians), were subjugated, "protected people", (dhimmis), in both legal and social contexts. It should be noted that while Jews were "protected people", the intended Islamic injunction is to discern between polytheists (who were not recognized as dhimmis), and monotheists mislead by the unreliability of their texts. Most notably they faced distinct (and often greater) taxcodes, but were oblige to dress codes and several other limitations. Yet, because Judaism and Christianity were acknowledged as partially valid, believers were allocated a legally sanctioned role within the state, and at times of prosperity they even flourished. Contradistinctively, there were times of more negative, discriminatory attitudes by Muslims towards Jews.
Altogether I was positively struck by both the balance and sweeping period covered by this book. Unfortunately, Lewis would later become notorious for his attitudes towards Muslims. He became less the academic historian and more the ideological functionary. Nonetheless, this is a great example of an academic rendering of a thousand years of Jewish-Islamic history.
July 8, 2018
Bernard Lewis writes with suppositions and strives to make his point with lack of population data and other statistics. Annotating stories are stretched or misused in order to establish his threads of thought. There were some entertaining moments when presumed ideas conflict. The book covers relationships between peoples of the ancient Near East, Europe and North Africa who are Islamic, Jewish and Christian.
January 18, 2016
The first chapter of this book was a solid five stars. It examines what the Koran and other seminal Islamic works say about how Jews should be treated. Lewis argues that by and large in Islamic countries Jews were not regularly forcibly converted, slaughtered, and expelled (like they were in Western Europe) -- though this did happen. Rather, Islamic law in general allows Jews to practice their religion as long as they are treated with systematic persecution, humiliation, and contempt. The rest of the book also is well researched and well written, but was simply of less interest to me (thus the three stars).
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September 23, 2010The Jews of Islam by Bernard Lewis (1987)
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews