Figure 1.--Erfoud is an oasis town in Morocco. Here there was a Berber Jewish community. The photo was taken about 1935. It shows Messaoud Assouline and Sarah Abehassera on the day of their wedding. We know that the boy was 13 years old, the minimum age to marry according to rabbinic law. Probably Sarah was 12, the minimum age for a girl.

Some Berber tribes adopted Judaism. We do not know just when this occurred or how many did so, but there were a small numner of Jewish Berbers as late as the World War II era. We believe it must have been before the Islamization of the Magreb. As disscussed above, there were Jews known to be in Morocco during the Phomecaian era, but many more Jews came during the Roman era. This would seem to have been the most likely period for Berber tribes to have adopted Judaism, probably before Christinaity was asopted as the state reigion. We have no idea how tribes converted. Some experts believe that there were large number, but most experts believe that it was a relatively small mumber. This seems to have occurred over time. Some experts date the adoption of Judaism abour the same time as the Jewish revolt in Roman Palestine (66-70). [Simon] Some of the ancient Judaized Berber tribes must have adopted Christianity and afterwards Islam. It is no proven if they were the ancestors of modern Berber-speaking Jews. [Hirschberg] This seems, however, the most likely origin of the modern tribes. Erfoud is an oasis town in Morocco. A Berber Jewish community was located there. We note a portrait taken about 1935. It shows Messaoud Assouline and Sarah Abehassera on the day of their wedding. We know that the boy was 13 years old, the minimum age to marry according to rabbinic law. Probably Sarah was 12, the minimum age for a girl. Some DNA studies have been conducted on North African Jews, including Moroccan Jews which tend to show that there was no significant admixture with the induigenouis Arab and Berbr population. The genetic evidence seems to indicate North African to be distinct from Berber populations and more similar to Ashkenazi Jewish populations. [Behar, et. al.] This would seem to nswer the question about the larger North African Jewish population, but the study does not seem to have focused on rhe small Berber Jewish population.

Sources

Behar, Doron M. et. al. "Counting the founders. The matrilineal genetic ancestry of the Jewish diaspora". PLoS ONE Vol., No. 4 (2008)

Hirschberg, H. Z. (1963). "The problem of the Judaized Berbers," The Journal of African History (Cambridge University Press: 1963), Vol. 4, No. 3, pp. 313–39.

Created: 9:58 PM 8/6/2009
Last updated: 4:19 AM 6/4/2011