Ottoman Jews and Plagues

Ottoman Jews and Plagues Yaron Ayalon (bio) In a monumental volume published in 1791, titled A Treatise of the Plague, the Scottish surgeon, herpetologist, and naturalist Patrick Russell described in detail his experience with plague outbreaks in Aleppo, where he was serving as the physician of the Levant Company. The city, and the eastern Mediterranean more broadly, suffered from several such epidemics in the course of the eighteenth century, often accompanied by other natural disasters that amplified their effect. From 1757 to 1764, for example, the city and the region more broadly suffered from drought and famine, a series of earthquakes, a two-year long plague epidemic, then two more years of famine.1 During the plague years, Russell conducted a study of 120 individuals who had contracted the disease. Although unaware of the causes of plague at the time, Russell's observations suggest that he understood that it was not transmitted simply by proximity to a sick individual, that familial ties played a key part in the treatment and healing process, and that responses to the epidemic had much to do with economics but little to do with religious affiliation.2 Historians, too, have recently come to recognize the tenuous connection between individual and collective responses to epidemics (and natural disasters more broadly) and religious or communal affiliation.3 Still, examining Ottoman Jews' responses to major crises such as epidemic outbreaks can illuminate the role that the Jewish community played in their lives at such moments, when state intervention often remained limited. Indeed, until the second half of the nineteenth century, the central Ottoman administration in Istanbul [End Page 46] responded to disasters with a limited arsenal of tools that mostly included tax remissions or reassessment, shipment of grain from one area to another, or the reconstruction of public buildings.4 This left many other unmet needs to be addressed locally, both by provincial officials and communal institutions. The role that religious communities played in people's lives thus increased dramatically during crises. During "normal" times, Ottoman Jews were far from segregated: many maintained extensive social, neighborly, business, and even familial networks with their non-Jewish neighbors. In many respects, the Jewish community as an institution faced serious competition from the other social and commercial networks that Jews took part in, and rabbis had a hard time promoting Jewish law as a guiding principle or enforcing particular behaviors.5 And yet, the Jewish community had almost no competition—and thus nearly complete control—in the realms of education and charity. It is the latter that matters most to the current discussion. In times of hardship and distress, the community functioned primarily as a relief agency. Its charitable institutions supported Jews, irrespective of their level of observance or involvement with religious life. Avenues for seeking charity across denominational lines were rare.6 In moderate disasters, when an epidemic was of short duration and its financial repercussions manageable, Jewish communities could generally handle demands without resorting to extraordinary measures. When a crisis lingered, in the case of a prolonged famine or severe outbreaks, resources would eventually run out. Such times posed a real challenge to the Jewish community as a cohesive, social unit. In response, communal leaders would address pressing needs by redesignating funds and property, where those were still available, to prioritize treating the sick and their families. They also diverted resources away from religious instruction toward more essential concerns, such as distributing grain to the poor as bread prices soared during a famine. Selling communal property, even at unfavorable prices, was another way to generate revenue. During such moments, congregations resorted to selling silver and gold artifacts from their synagogues to wealthy Jews and non-Jews alike.7 It was also common practice for communal leaders to suspend ordinances (takanot) that governed their coreligionists' behavior once they realized that most of the members of their community were no longer in a position to comply with them: plagues and natural disasters were, no doubt, among the events that set such procedures in motion.8 At this stage, communal representatives typically turned to wealthier Jews to ask for further support. The response, as we can imagine, was not always positive. We

Ancient history · Archaeology · Ethnology · Famine · Genealogy · Geography · Judaism · Natural disaster · Outbreak · Plague (disease) · History · Medicine · Virology · Yersinia bacterium, plague, ectoparasites research

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