The Burden of Identity: Sépharade by Eliette Abecassis

Caught between multiple identities and family ties, Esther Vidal is unable to escape the constraints of something that looks like a ´project assigned to her from birth`. Assigned by her parents and her family, but also by the society. She is floating from an identity to the other - Moroccan, French, Alsacian, Jewish, Sephardi - adding more weight to her everyday spiritual burden.

Sépharade by Eliette Abecassis is a long story of many stories told in the quiet voice of the 1001 Nights, North African style. There are stories of the stories starting as far as the beginning of Jewish history. But there is hardly a topic left behind: from Jewish history to literature, anthropological insights into the  traditional world of Moroccan Jews, the relationships between different Moroccan Jewish communities, the immigration to Israel and the discrimination experiences of the Jews of non-European origin, but also the complicated political relationship between Morocco and Israel. There is suspense, and romance and unexpected situations, even a whodunit. There are culinary details that smells like dafina - the Moroccan variant of chulent (I know will be accused of cultural abuse but I take the risk) - and the many secrets of preparing the tastiest couscous in the world. 

It seems like Eliette Abecassis wants to tell everything you need to know about Moroccan Jews while creating a standalone story. There are many aspects that are fascinating, but there are also a couple of clichés, like for instance the ´classical´ unbreakable differentiation between Askenazim and Sephardim/Mizrahim (whose food is better, who is warmer, who is more respectful towards parents). Such an approach, although common in the minds and hearts of many representatives of both groups, only perpetuates the simplistic - kitsch even - mindset within both groups. None of them should be ashamed of the historical heritage and instead of drawing such cartoons, we are better grateful for the huge diversity of traditions and histories. I may love couscous and hate hering and embrace the post-Shoah trauma of my family by celebrating life and resilience.

But there is much more to Sépharade than those fake problems. The lecture offers an imaginary refuge covering many generations and historical periods, the stories are offering a lot of food for thought and challenges for everyone learning every day new juggling skills between tradition, modernity and various assigned and assumed identities. It tells stories about a world that is still here and hopefully will continue to be part of the present because it belongs to our Jewish heritage. 

I´ve read the book in the original French language.

Rating: 3.5 stars

The honour of being the last Jew

In the middle of the crisis, strong personalities decide to take the challenge and continue to keep their principles. Even though the stubbornness is only of the heart, while the need for survival might send a different message, not giving up means more than claiming loudly a statement to the world. 

Suddenly today, out of nowhere, I had the realization that maybe we are living today one of the best times in the Jewish history: there are many situations when our life is in danger, but compared to the life as a Jew in the Spain during the Inquisition or the WWII Germany, we are living freely and without fear. Maybe because now we have a state to defend us?

With so much cruel reality around, I am very reluctant to read historical fiction, but Noah Gordon's Last Jew caught me faster than expected because: 1) I had for a while the unluck to be forced by circumstances to keep my Jewishness secret; 2) it offers a certain historical introduction to the later discussions about the possibility to get back the Spanish citizenship for the Jews expelled from Spain. In the second case, I also tried to think from a personal perspective: one of my grandfathers was one of them and even was speaking ladino. But how can I bring the documents from 5 centuries back, from a time when citizenship wasn't existent and not even the precious IDs or other clear archives ?

Yonah Toledano, the hero of Gordon's book, is able to keep his promise of remaining a Jew in an epoch when even the most fervent baptized Jews that were eventually accepted as part of the clergy were not considered 'pure' enough and burned at stake. Through hard work and discretion and a sense of the danger, he succeed to become a trustworthy surgeon when the Jews where not allowed to be in such positions, without being baptized or making a loud 'faith' show. What kept me awake till the end of the book was the authenticity of the story and the similarity with situations I've heard, read and was told about. More than being a work of historical fiction, the book has that pint of reality that kept me interested. 

The sad story is that such situations repeated over and over again. Even now, being a Jew in France or Hungary or in the Arab lands might present a certain level of risk. The good news is that we were able to survive and even more, to return to faith despite all the terrible things that happened to us. And there are so many true stories waiting to be told that are much better than any historical fiction.