Spiriti e riti ebraici a Meknes. Seduti alla “tavola di David”

Spirit possession of Muslim Arabs by Jewish spirits in Meknes, Morocco, is a largely unstudied phenomenon because Jewish spirits represent an absolute otherness in the Moroccan pantheon and their rites are private, domestic, and reserved, unlike the public collective rituals typically examined. This case study of an evocation rite analyzes how such possession refashions personal identity, human relationships, and gender roles, highlighting the link between ritual and daily life.

Study at a glance

Abstract

The paper focuses on spirit possession of Muslim Arabs by Jewish spirits in Meknes, Morocco. It is a topic that has not been extensively studied in ethnographic literature yet, both because Jewish spirits represent an absolute otherness compared to the Moroccan pantheon, and rites dedicated to them are reserved. Furthermore, studies on spirit possession in Morocco have mainly focused on the rituals in which spirits are publicly and collectively evoked. The possession by Jewish spirits, evoked only in the domestic sphere and strictly private, is an important arena to explore the relationship between ritual and the daily life of the possessed. The case study examined here is an evocation rite, and the analysis seeks to highlight the role of possession in the refashioning of personal identity, human relationships and gender roles.