JEWS--SUPERSTITIONS
We read in the New Testament of Jews scattered all over the Roman
Empire. The same is true of them to-day in Turkey. Their principal
resorts are Constantinople, Smyrna, Salonica, and the other great towns.
Some are original colonists, principally from Palestine; others are
exiles from Spain in 1493. Common vicissitudes with the Moors, who had
also been ejected from Spain, created sympathy for them in the Moslem
world, and, to the honour of the Turk let it be told, they were offered
a shelter and a home. These immigrants introduced with them the jargon
which they had employed in Spain, and which consists of a mixture of
Hebrew and Spanish, and is known as Judeo-Spanish. To it have been
grafted a number of Italian and Turkish words, and it has been adopted
as the common vernacular of both classes of Jews above mentioned.
[Illustration: A CEMETERY BY THE BOSPHORUS.]
Another division is that of Hebrews from Russia, Poland, and Austria.
These do not understand Judeo-Spanish, but speak corrupt Russian and
German, and differ from their southern brethren in features and customs;
they all adhere to the law of Moses, and accept the teaching of the
Prophets. There exists also a sect of Jews called _Dunmes_, or
turncoats, who are both Mahomedans and Jews. Ostensibly they are the
former, and observe all Moslem rites, but secretly they practise those
of the Hebrews also.
The Dunmes give their children two names, one a Turkish, such as
Mustapha, and the other a Hebrew, such as Jacob.
They reside chiefly in Salonica, and are very fanatical, and were the
ringleaders of a riot against the Christians in 1870. On the other hand,
several have distinguished themselves recently by joining the Reform
Party in Turkey, known as Young Turks, who overthrew Sultan Hamid, and
introduced the Constitution.
Perhaps they are the only class of Jews who are seamen, and it is
interesting to watch their flotilla of small boats board the steamers
that arrive in Salonica. From their screams and shouts, you would think
yourself in pandemonium. The originator of the sect was a certain
Sabbatai Levy, who proclaimed himself the Messiah in 1648, but
afterwards accepted Mahomedanism to save his life. His adherents believe
in his return, and it is stated that one of their number always awaits
the arrival of the railway-train in Salonica to offer him a welcome.
Jews in Turkey are not relegated to ghettos, as in several European
cities, but all the same they live in separate quarters, as, indeed, do
all the other nationalities. Their quarters may be recognized by their
malodorous smells, their filth, and the numerous families residing in
the houses, and also from the babel of tongues, and the shrill,
discordant voices of women or children shouting to each other or
quarrelling.
Jews in the East engage principally in commerce, banking,
money-changing, pawnbrokerage, dealings on the Stock Exchange,
watchmaking, and shopkeeping.
A feature among them is the early age at which boys commence earning
their daily bread. As young as six or seven you may see them going about
with trays containing cigarette-papers, pins, matches, and similar cheap
articles. Boys in this country will marvel at the ease and rapidity with
which mere tots can work calculations mentally in the course of their
business.
When they grow up to manhood many engage in window-cleaning, an
occupation which has come to be a Jewish speciality, and which an
Eastern servant will resent if called upon to undertake. Others go about
riveting or cementing broken china, or, with a small charcoal brazier
and soldering irons, as tinkers; others sell a special kind of sand for
cleaning pots and pans, which they hawk about under its Latin name of
_arena_. Some make a speciality of buying, washing, and sorting empty
bottles, which they afterwards re-sell with profit; others, of course,
buy up old clothes, or, with a capacious wooden box slung over their
back, go about selling all those little articles which are indispensable
to ladies. When called to a house they spread out all their
paraphernalia, and the bargaining, which Easterns take such a delight
in, begins--buyer and seller trying to outwit and deceive each
other--the housewife feeling happy and virtuous all day if she has
beaten down the Jew to one-third of his demands, and the Jew unhappy
because he had not charged more.
Hebrew marriages in the East occur at an early period of life, fifteen
with girls and eighteen with boys, and even earlier in Palestine. The
result is large families and much destitution, but with all that one
seldom sees any Jewish beggars, their system for relief of poverty being
so admirable. They are frugal in their habits, living largely on bread,
salt-fish, leeks, and onions, and, during the season, on fruits. The
produce sold in their shambles is, moreover, of the cheapest and most
inferior quality, yet, notwithstanding all this, the Jews are the
longest lived and healthiest of the Eastern races.
The dress of those in Constantinople consists of two or three long
gowns, open below the knees; the sleeves are long. Their head-dress is
the Turkish fez. In winter they wear long furs over their gowns. Married
women cover their hair with a sort of bag-like embroidered kerchief,
called _yemeni_, which is painted with flowers and ornamented with lace
and seed-pearls.
Within recent years much has been done, both by the Jewish Alliance and
the Scottish and English Mission Schools, to educate boys and girls, and
there is certainly a great improvement.
Jews are fatalists, and are convinced that the decrees of fate are
unalterable, yet they imagine that Providence may be cheated and thus
deterred from its purposes. Accordingly, if Joseph happens to fall ill,
and there is a likelihood of his dying, they forthwith change his name
into, we will say, Benjamin, and they expect that when the Angel of
Death arrives to fulfil his mission he will think he has made a mistake,
and gone to the wrong house. So everyone in the room keeps addressing
the invalid as Benjamin, and, should he recover, they all congratulate
themselves on their masterly deception.
Another expedient, but principally connected with children's ailments,
is to trap the malevolent demon who has induced the sickness, and this
they profess to do by laying a trail of sugar from the child's sick-bed
to a well. The greedy demon follows the track, and gets drowned!
Dread of the evil-eye is as prevalent with the Jews as with the other
races in Turkey. They believe that there are certain malignant spirits
in existence who are envious of men's happiness and do all they can to
destroy it, especially when any self-praise or praise by others has been
expressed by the lips. This power, it is further believed, is not
restricted to demons, but is also shared by individuals, especially
those possessing blue eyes. Quite an elaborate series of antidotes or
prophylactics are adopted as a preservative against such influence, the
most potent of which is to prefix to each commendation the magic
spell-word _Mashalla_--_i.e._, "In the name of God." To this may be
added the power of the blue bead, the evil spirit having a great
predilection for that colour. Hence, if you praise a child for its
beauty, and it happens to wear blue beads, the spirit's attention will
be so absorbed with the bead that it will not hear your remarks. Another
preservative is garlic, which has a repellent effect on the evil spirit.
As a consequence, everything in Turkey that has to be protected from the
evil-eye is decorated either with the one or the other, and you seldom
see a horse, a draught ox, or even a donkey, that has not a string of
blue beads about its neck. Children wear these charms on their caps; and
the prows of boats, the roofs of houses, cages of birds, and even hovels
have a bunch of garlic suspended with strings. It is even stated that
bouquets of flowers formed of spices, and in the centre of which garlic
is nestled, are sent as a present to the mother of a new-born infant, as
a safeguard both to herself and the child.
Suspended along with the garlic on the gables of Turkish houses framed
texts from the Koran are often to be seen, and on the doorposts of
Hebrew houses a small tablet with the word _Shadai_ (the Almighty).
Jewish houses have also imprinted on the walls the impress of a man's
hand, with the five fingers outstretched. In Christian houses the
prophylactic takes the form of a cross, which frequently is nailed on
the eaves during the process of building.