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Accepted Paper:
Jewish angels, Arab letters: Jewish-Yemeni amulets as cultural mediators
Tom Fogel
(The Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
Paper short abstract:
Inter-religious relationship between Muslim majority and Jewish minority in Yemen were mediated by means of creating amulets, combining material and textual aspects. Using both ethnographic and textual methods, this lecture will examine the question of how magical objects mark religious boundaries.
Paper long abstract:
Inter-religious relationship between Muslim majority and Jewish minority in Yemen were mediated by practices of magical healing or magical protection, by means of creating amulets or by summoning of demons and angels, performed by Jews and Muslims alike. The making of amulets combined material and textual aspects. Jewish craftsmen created the silver necklace containing the amulet, while its content was based on interpretation of amulets guide-books manuscripts. These manuscripts offer a complex matrix of Muslim and Jewish sources, and contain a bewildering mosaic of languages, Arabic, Hebrew and Aramaic. Composing and using such books required an act of translation, interpretation and mediation of knowledge by Jewish-Yemeni scholars. By utilizing both ethnographic and textual methods, this lecture will examine the question of how magical objects mark religious boundaries, and what are the cultural expressions that cross these boundaries.