Law and Religious Minorities in Medieval Societies: Between Theory and Praxis

This volume shows through the use of legal sources that law was used to try to erect boundaries between communities in order to regulate or restrict interaction between the faithful and the non-faithful; and at the same time show how these boundaries were repeatedly transgressed and negociated.

Muslim law developed a clear legal cadre for dhimmīs, inferior but protected non-Muslim communities (in particular Jews and Christians) and Roman Canon law decreed a similar status for Jewish and Muslim communities in Europe. Yet the theoretical hierarchies between faithful and infidel were constantly brought into question in the daily interactions between men and women of different faiths in streets, markets, bath-houses, law courts, etc. The twelve essays in this volume explore these tensions and attempts to resolve them. These contributions show that law was used to try to erect boundaries between communities in order to regulate or restrict interaction between the faithful and the non-faithful—and at the same time how these boundaries were repeatedly transgressed and negotiated. These essays explore also the possibilities and the limits of the use of legal sources for the social historian.

Introduction – Ana Echevarria and Juan Pedro Monferrer-Sala

I. From Sacred Texts to Social Regulation / Del texto sagrado a la regulación social

Defending Jewish Judicial Autonomy in the Islamic Middle Ages – Mark R. Cohen

The Melkites and Their Law: Between Autonomy and Assimilation – Johannes Pahlitzsch

Cadíes, alfaquíes y la transmisión de la sharī‘a en época mudéjar – Ana Echevarria

Straddling the Bounds: Jews in the Legal World of Islam – David J. Wasserstein

II. Negotiating Daily Contacts and Frictions / Negociando contactos y fricciones diarias

El criterio de los juristas malikíes sobre los alimentos y las bebidas de los dimmíes: entre la teoría y la práctica – María Arcas Campoy

‘Twenty-five hundred knidia of wine… and two boats to transport the wine to Fustāt’. An Insight into Wine Consumption and Use Amongst the dhimmīs and wider Communities in Umayyad Egypt – Myriam Wissa

In the Eyes of Others: Nāmūs and sharī‘ah in Christian Arab Authors. Some Preliminary Details for a Typological Study – Juan Pedro Monferrer-Sala

Los vapores de la sospecha. El baño público entre el mundo andalusí y la Castilla medieval (siglos X–XIII) – Marisa Bueno

III. Application of the Law / La aplicación de la ley

Swearing by the Mujaljala: A fatwā on dhimmī Oaths in the Islamic West – Camilla Adang

Forum Shopping in al-Andalus (II): Discussing Coran V, 42 and 49 (Ibn Ḥazm, Ibn Rushd al-Jadd, Abū Bakr Ibn al-ʽArabī and al-Qurṭubī) – Delfina Serrano

Religious Minorities’ Identity and Application of the Law: A First Approximation to the Lands of Military Orders in Castile – Clara Almagro Vidal

La interacción en el espacio de dos sociedades diferentes: concordia establecida entre el bachiller Hernando Alonso y la aljama de moros de Talavera – Yolanda Moreno Moreno

What do Legal Sources Tell Us about Social Practice? Possibilities and Limits – John Tolan