History of the Jews in Madagascar

Legends of ancient Jewish ancestry in Madagascar often feature red zebu—a local adaptation of the red heifer mentioned in the Torah.

Accounts of Jews in Madagascar go back to the earliest ethnographic descriptions of the island, from the mid-17th century. Madagascar has a small Jewish population, including normative adherents as well as para-Jewish mystics, but the island has not historically been a significant center for Jewish settlement. Despite this, an enduring origin myth across Malagasy ethnic groups suggests that the island's inhabitants descended from ancient Jews, and thus that the modern Malagasy and Jewish peoples share a racial affinity. This belief, termed the 'Malagasy secret', is so widespread that some Malagasy refer to the island's people as the Diaspora Jiosy Gasy (Malagasy Jewish Diaspora). As a result, Jewish symbols, paraphernalia, and teachings have been integrated into the syncretic religious practices of some Malagasy populations. Similar notions of Madagascar's supposed Israelite history persisted in European chronicles of the island until the early 20th century, and may have influenced a Nazi plan to relocate Europe's Jews to Madagascar.

In the 21st century, some Malagasy communities informally identified with Jews and Judaism have adopted rabbinic Judaism, studying the Torah and Talmud and undergoing Orthodox conversion. The unified rabbinic Jewish community refers to its ethnic division within Judaism as Madagascar Sepharad.

Theories of Jewish origin of Malagasy people

Betsileo legend holds that the rosewood collected for Solomon's Temple came from Madagascar's lowland forests.

It has been claimed by Prince Ndriana Rabarioelina, a member of the Merina royal family, that the red, white, and black royal lamba (pictured above on King Andrianampoinimerina) shares roots with similar Levite robes described in the Midrash.

The 'Malagasy secret'

There is a widespread, centuries-old belief in Madagascar that Malagasy people are descended from Jews, with "probably millions" of people in Madagascar claiming genealogical origins in ancient Israel. This belief is termed the 'Malagasy secret', and is so common that some Malagasy refer to their people(s) as the Diaspora Jiosy Gasy (Malagasy Jewish Diaspora). The origin myths, which vary across clans, often include ancestors arriving at the shores of Madagascar bearing "red zebu", a localized adaptation of the biblical red heifer tradition. Further belief holds that Madagascar has been settled by Jews since ancient times, and that the island was associated with ancient Ophir. These same legends assert that the rosewood used in the construction of the Temple of Solomon came from the lowland forests of Madagascar. Descent from members of this Solomonic fleet is prominently claimed by the Merina and Betsileo peoples. The Merina royal line has often claimed to descend from an ancient wave of Israelite migration that arrived via Asia in Madagascar, after being exiled by the Neo-Babylonian emperor Nebuchadnezzar. Antemoro people claim Moses as their forebearer. Sakalava and Antandroy people explain certain taboos within their respective cultures as originating with ancient Israelite ancestors. Some Malagasy theories of Jewish provenance suggest ancestral origin in one or more of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel, most commonly Gad, Issachar, Dan, and Asher. Another narrative linking ancient Hebrews to Madagascar asserts that Madagascar was the site of the Garden of Eden (with various island rivers around Mananjary cited as the true Biblical Pishon). Similar 'crypto-Jewish' legends exist in neighboring Comoros and Mozambique.

The 'Jewish thesis'

The theory that Malagasy people can trace their ancestry to ancient Jews—termed the 'Jewish thesis'—is asserted in the earliest writings on the question of Malagasy origins, and by the late 19th and early 20th centuries had become a "conviction" of the many European chroniclers of the island. Common substantiations for the thesis included observations of "linguistic similarities [between Hebrew and Malagasy]; common physiognomic traits; alimentary and hygiene taboos; some sort of monotheism [with the Malagasy naming Zanahary as their one, un-picturable God]; observance of a lunar calendar; and life-cycle events resembling those in the Jewish tradition, circumcision in particular". A similar 'Arab thesis' was also prevalent, though less persistent and popular than its Jewish counterpart.

The British merchant Richard Boothby of the East India Company posited in 1646 that the people of Madagascar are descended from the Hebrew patriarch Abraham and his wife Keturah, and were sent away by Abraham to "inhabit the East". The introduction (credited to Captain William Mackett) of Robert Drury's 1729 memoir suggests that "the Jew derived a great deal from [the Malagasy], instead of they from the Jews ... their religion is more ancient". Samuel Copland wrote in 1822 that "The origin of the [Malagasy], is, by the generality of writers, ascribed to the Jews." The naturalist Alfred Grandider affirmed supposed evidence of two waves of ancient Israelite migration to Madagascar in 1901, concluding: "The fleets sent by King Solomon towards the Southeast coast of Africa [to procure materials for his Temple] had probably some of their ships lost on the coasts of Madagascar and it is not unlikely that, in ancient times, some Jewish colonies had been founded, voluntarily or not, in this island." Grandider also compared the cultural practices of the Malagasy to those of the ancient Israelites, finding in common thirty-five features including animal sacrifice, scapegoating, similar funerary conventions, and practices comparable to metzitzah b'peh and the ordeal of the bitter water. That same year, Irish anthropologist Augustus Henry Keane published The Gold of Ophir: Whence Brought and by Whom?, in which he proposed that Ophir's gold was brought from Madagascar. In 1946, Arthur Leib wrote that Malagasy practice of numerology is the product of Jewish influence on the people. Also in 1946, Joseph Briant published L'hebreu à Madagascar, an influential comparative study of the Malagasy and Hebrew languages that purported to find substantial commonalities between the two.

Lars Dahle wrote critically on the comparative arguments for the thesis in 1833: "The truth is, I think, that similarity of customs is nearly worthless as a sign of relationship, if not supported and borne out by other proofs of more importance". The British explorer Samuel Copeland argued in 1847 that Malagasy people have “neither customs, traditions, rites, nor ceremonies sufficiently analogous to justify us in assigning their origin to that [Jewish] people." In 1924, Chase Osborn protested at the Jewish thesis that "not one of the [Malagasy] tribes have the great Jewish nose which has followed that people during all time and is a sign of strength."

Contemporary analyses of colonial European theories of Jewish Malagasy origin have noted that "the identification of Levitical customs was an obsession of the missionaries and early European anthropologists," and that "squaring the Bible’s assertion of universality and shared descent from Noah’s three sons with the realities of global diversity was [...] a central preoccupation of generations of ecclesiasts and Christian voyagers." Eric T. Jennings argues that the discourses about Jewish roots in Madagascar led to the selection of the island by Nazi Germany for the Madagascar Plan, a proposed forcible relocation of Europe's Jews to Madagascar.

The highlands Betsileo commune of Alakamisy Ambohimaha is home to Ivolamena, a holy site where cliffs bearing inscriptions are held by believers as artifacts of ancient Solomonic ancestors of the Betsileo people.

Alakamisy Ambohimaha

A site called Ivolamena in Alakamisy Ambohimaha contains cliffs that were studied in the 1950s by a team of French researchers following "rumors in the region of Fianarantsoa about the existence of letters carved in stone". They described an inscription on the cliff-face "imputable to characters derived from the Phoenician alphabet with a high probability that the [glyphs] emanate from the family of southern-Arabic [glyphs] called Sabaean." The team also hypothesized, based on commonalities between Sabaean and Malagasy irrigation techniques, that 'Hamito-Semites' may have been the first to bring zebu cattle to Madagascar. Another nearby site, Vohisoratra (meaning 'the mountain with writings'), was reported to bear "an inscription calling to mind Hebrew characters." The researchers had received tips from a Malagasy informant, who suggested that the Vohisoratra inscriptions might be dated "to the time of king Solomon, who sent the Israelites across the world to seek precious stones for the building of Jerusalem". In 1962, Pierre Vérin summarized scientific opinions of the inscriptions as "divided", and asserted that geologists consider the supposed inscriptions to be the products of "natural erosion".

The Ivolamena and Vohisoratra sites are today revered as a supernatural holy site by Betsileo claimants of ancient Israelite ancestry, who believe that both cliffs' inscriptions were left by their forebearers during a voyage to gather materials for Solomon's Temple during which they married the locals of a legendary 'Zafindrandoto' tribe and settled to found the earliest Betsileo communities. A January 1989 speech by then-president of Madagascar Didier Ratsiraka made reference to the local beliefs surrounding the Ambohimaha cliff, which he claimed bore "proto-Hebraïc" writings. Ratsiraka also reportedly requested that teams of Malagasy archaeologists investigate the question of Madagascar's Jewish roots and conduct digs in the Betsileo region to search for the biblical Queen of Sheba's treasure. In 2009, residents of Alakamisy Ambohimaha threatened adherents of "Hebraic Judaism" who had come to the cliffs and sacrificed two lambs, one black and one white, despite the local fady (taboo) against slaughtering sheep. The Betsileo locals called for the government to recognize the commune as a sacred site of historical heritage, and protect it accordingly.

Later investigations

No genetic testing has been done on specific Malagasy populations to corroborate claims of Jewish phylogenetic heritage. Genetic and linguistic studies that inquire broadly about Malagasy origins generally point to Austronesian settlement as the earliest human presence on the island, followed by waves of migration from other regions including East Africa. A 2013 DNA study of the Antemoro people found two haplogroups linked to Middle Eastern origins in their parental lineages.

Nathan Devir judged the possibility of Malagasy racial descent from one of the Ten Lost Tribes to be "unlikely but possible" given the body of genetic research on Malagasy origins. It has been alternatively proposed that Jews may have been among the 10th-century Arab traders, or fleeing the Portuguese Inquisition among the 15th-century Portuguese sailors, who came to Madagascar. Tudor Parfitt asserts that "There is good reason to believe that Portugese anusim settled in Madagascar."

Jewish communities in Madagascar

Zafy Ibrahim

17th century French colonial governor Étienne de Flacourt reported of a group called the Zafy Ibrahim, whom he'd encountered between 1644 and 1648 in the vicinity of the island of Nosy Boraha, who were of Jewish identity and descent. The 500-600 people constituting the group were described in de Flacourt's account as being unfamiliar with Muhammad (considering his followers to be "lawless men"), celebrating and resting on Saturdays (unlike members of the island's Muslim population, who rested on Fridays), and bearing Hebrew names like Moses, Isaac, Jacob, Rachel and Noah. The group collectively maintained a regional monopoly on religious animal sacrifice. The Zafy Ibrahim have been theorized variously to be Yemenite Jews, Khajirites, Qarmatian Ismaili Gnostics, Coptic or Nestorian Christians, and pre-Islamic Arabs coming from Ethiopia. In 1880, James Sibree published an account of the Zafy Ibrahim in Ambohipeno, quoting one in affirmation: "we are altogether Jews". An 1888 report described the Zafy Ibrahim's Hebraic rites and observances as "only a remote vibration of Judeo-Arabic influence." By the French colonial period, Zafy Ibrahim began to identify themselves as Arabs and integrate into the Betsimisaraka people, and the people of Nosy Boraha today call themselves 'Arabs'.

Colonial Period

After France colonized the island and Europeans began settling there in the 19th century, a small number of Jewish families settled in Antananarivo, but did not establish a Jewish community.

Madagascar was governed between August 1918 and July 1919 by a French-Jewish politician, Abraham Schrameck.

The 1941 census of Madagascar, then a colony under the rule of Vichy France, counted 26 Jews, half of whom were of French nationality. Despite this small population, the Pétainist Director of Education Olivier Leroy held a public conference in 1942 in Antananarivo on "Antisémitisme et Révolution nationale"—"Antisemitism and national revolution". Further, the antisemitic laws of Vichy France were applied to all of its overseas territories and colonies, including Madagascar. As such, Madagascar's 26 Jews were legally excluded from the army, press, commercial and industrial activities, and the civil service. In 2011, Adam Rovner found just one Jewish grave on the island, belonging to Captain Israel Solomon Genussow. Genussow was a South African Jewish soldier for the British Army who grew up in Palestine and died in action on July 30, 1944, at the age of 28. It was described as the only known Jewish grave in Madagascar in 2017.

Between 1947 and 1948, a Jew living in Madagascar named Lionel Mussard sent a series of letters to the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee describing the conditions of Madagascar's Jews and requesting legal and financial assistance for his community. He writes in his first letter: "Since June 1940, when armistice was signed between France and Germany, all Jews in Madagascar were in troubles. Even our properties were taken by the government ruling the country at that time. We are not allowed to work as merchants, because we are Jews. In 1942, my brother had a big stock of rice, corn and manioc which was requisitioned by the government and since that time he never received any payment for those goods ... A few people here in [Antananarivo] who are Jews do not want to declare that they are so as they are afraid ... Consequently, the Jew Community here cannot have any meeting (official)." He goes on in further letters to approximate the number of Jews in Madagascar as 1,200 including children, some of whom were born on the island.

In 1950, a council of Haredi rabbis in Paris sought the guidance of the Chief Rabbi of Israel, Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog, regarding the permissibility of consuming zebu meat under Jewish dietary laws. Their inquiry was part of an effort to set up kosher slaughterhouses in Madagascar for the purpose of exporting meat to Israel. The inquiry generated a halakhic controversy among rabbinic authorities. Rabbi Herzog's positive stance was prominently challenged by Rabbi Avrohom Yeshaya Karelitz. Ultimately, the Chief Rabbinate declined to approve the Malagasy meat, in deference to Rabbi Karelitz's argument.

In 1955, the Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson, leader of the Lubavitch-Chabad Hasidic Jewish movement, asked Rabbi Yosef Wineberg to go to Madagascar "in order to find any stray sheep of the House of Israel". At the time, the only Jews known to be on the island were a doctor with no Jewish identity, and a Jewish man who had written a telegram requesting conserved Kosher meats, because the region had no Kosher butchers. "I'm sure you'll find there more than one [Jew]," the Rebbe reportedly wrote in a letter to Rabbi Wineberg. Wineberg found and made contact with "about eight" Iraqi Jewish families in Madagascar. He affixed mezuzot to their doors, gave them a shofar, and taught them how to pray as a group. In 1961, the Rebbe wrote a letter in reply to a Jewish woman in Madagascar.

Communauté Juive de Madagascar

The country is home to a small normative Jewish Malagasy population (in addition to a greater number of Jewish-identifying practitioners of syncretic combinations of Christianity, Judaism, Islam and traditional ancestor-worship and animism, including the 2,000 members of the roughly twelve Messianic Jewish congregations in Madagascar, which syncretically incorporate Judaic elements into Christian belief). The community of "a couple hundred" Malagasy Jews in Ampanotokana arrived at rabbinic Judaism in 2010 as the result of three regional Messianic Jewish groups splintering off and studying the Torah. In 2012, the state recognized the unified rabbinic Jewish organization as the formal Communauté Juive de Madagascar (Jewish Community of Madagascar).

The community's president is Ashrey Dayves (born Andrianarisao Asarery), who leads alongside Peteola (Andre Jacque Rabisisoa), who serves as the Hebrew teacher, and Touvya (Ferdinand Jean Andriatovomanana), the community's chazzan. The group refers to its ethnic division within Judaism as Madagascar Sepharad, praying in Sephardic-accented Hebrew and practicing a Sephardic-style liturgy, which they say was suggested to them by a Dutch Jew who thought Ashkenazi tradition would be inappropriate for such a decidedly non-European population.

Conversion and post-conversion activities

In 2013, group members came in contact with a Jewish outreach group, who helped the community to organize a group Orthodox conversion. Some members of this community were reportedly hesitant to convert to Orthodoxy because they understood themselves to already be ethnically Jewish. Nathan Devir interpreted the Malagasy view of Judaism—which considers it an inherited parentage to be enacted through religious practice—as being "out of step" with the traditional notion of conversion. He reports that in 2013, some Malagasy Jews opposed to the prospect of conversion "[saw] their 'Jewish blood' as precluding the need for any formal conversion process." In May 2016, after five years of self-study in Judaism, 121 members of the Malagasy Jewish community underwent conversion in accordance with traditional Jewish rituals; appearing before a beit din and submerged in a river mikvah. Because the local Parks Department denied the Communauté's request to build a temporary structure on the Ikopa River in which to disrobe (with mikvah baths traditionally requiring complete nudity), the ritual occurred at a river far from town, and the converts built a tent from tarp and wood to protect their privacy. The conversion, presided over by three Orthodox rabbis, was followed by fourteen weddings and vow renewals under a makeshift chuppah at a hotel in Antananarivo.

Nathan Devir analyzes Malagasy Judaic adherence in context of the ancestor-honoring traditions of Madagascar's culture, writing that for Madagascar's new Jews, "the imperative to live Jewishly is a way to honour the ancestors more truly and efficiently." He also notes that Malagasy Jews reject the ancestor-venerating funerary practice of famadihana because it is effectively prohibited by Jewish burial custom.

Members of the Communauté Juive de Madagascar reported antisemitic discrimination following their conversion: some private schools refused to register Jewish children after learning of their religious affiliation, and one landlord cancelled a lease contract after learning that the rental house was going to be used as a Jewish religious school. Members of the community also reported "unwelcome attention" and comments for their religious attire.

In 2018, 11 more members of the Ampanotokana Jewish community underwent Orthodox conversion, presided over by a Belgian-Malagasy rabbi. In November 2019, the group formed a Vaad (rabbinical council) to handle and publish guidance of halakha (Jewish law). In 2021, the Communauté Juive de Madagascar opened a printing shop to generate income for the community and print Jewish texts.

Malagasy people with a valiha, an indigenous musical instrument believed by many Malagasy to have been inherited from King David.

Aaronites

William F.S. Miles documents various Malagasy religious communities claiming Jewish lineage, including a robe-wearing, animal-sacrificing "Aaronite" sect in their village of Mananzara, who assert that their Jewish ancestors, among whom they count Aaron, brother of Moses, were swept to Madagascar in the deluge of Genesis. The Jewish identity of Mananzara villagers is also expressed in the logo of their elected leader Roger Randrianomanana, which features a six-pointed Star of David alongside a Malagasy valiha (which many Malagasy claim are inherited from King David). Miles also documents a group of contemporary "kings and scribes" in Vatumasina, who claim descendance from an Arabized Jewish figure named Ali Ben Forah, or Alitawarat (Ali of the Torah), who came to Madagascar from Mecca in the 15th century. Nathan Devir describes Merina traditionalist groups, among them the Loharanom-Pitahiana (meaning 'the Source of the Blessing') of Ambohimiadana, who are identified with rabbinic and Messianic Jewish communities on the island but do not feel a need to align their own religion, which they prefer to call 'Hebraic religion' or 'Aaronism', with the norms of rabbinic Judaism, which they regard as a later and somewhat strayed derivation from the ancient Israelite creed inherited by the Merina. The group purports to guard such treasures as the Ark of the Covenant, fragments of the Tablets of Stone, and Moses' staff in their village. Still others claim that the Hebrew treasures were lost in a fire during the French repression of the Malagasy Uprising of 1947. They reject the Talmud, Kabbalah, and other post-biblical texts, and have "politely declined" invitations to integrate into the Communauté Juive de Madagascar.

Foreign affairs

The Madagascar Plan

Main article: Madagascar Plan

Léon Cayla, the Governor-General of Madagascar from 1930 to 1939, was a strong opponent of Jewish relocation to Madagascar.

In the summer of 1940, following various similar proposals made by Jews and anti-semites alike since the late 19th century, Nazi Germany proposed the Madagascar Plan, according to which 4 million European Jews would be expelled and forcibly relocated to the island. Eric T. Jennings has argued that the plan's persistence, from its earliest public proposals to its explorations by the French, Polish, and German governments during World War II, stems from the 'Jewish thesis' discourse regarding Madagascar's supposed ancient Jewish roots. In 1937, Bealanana and Ankaizinana, two very remote areas with high elevations and low population densities, were identified by a French "expert" delegation of three men, two of whom were Jews, as a possible site for Jewish relocation.

Léon Cayla, the colonial Governor-General of Madagascar from May 1930 to April 1939, was a strong opponent of the Polish proposal, arguing persistently against Jewish immigration to the island, and ignoring and rebuffing repeated appeals from various Jewish organizations to allow for the mass resettlement and immigration of Polish Jews to Madagascar. The reaction in the tightly-censored Malagasy press echoed this opposition, expressing concern that the relocated Jews "would not remain engaged in agriculture for long but would move into trading or compete with the locals for the remaining jobs" and would receive favorable treatment and assistance from the Colonial Minister over the indigenous Malagasy and long-established French settlers on the island. It was "unanimously lamented" that Madagascar was willing to spend money on the internment of Spanish refugees in France and the resettlement of Polish Jews, but did nothing for its colonies. Two antisemitic letters to Cayla from Malagasy artillerymen stationed in Syria, both expressing opposition and concern at the prospect of Jewish settlement of the island, were apparently marked by Cayla for inclusion in a collection of negative reactions to potential Jewish immigration, to be shown to his superiors in Paris.

The plan, which relied on the French colony of Madagascar being handed over to Germany, was shelved after the British capture of Madagascar from Vichy in 1942. It was permanently abandoned with the commencement of the Final Solution, the policy of systematic genocide of Jews.

President Philibert Tsiranana of Madagascar, Foreign Minister of Israel Golda Meir, and Israeli President Yitzhak Ben-Zvi signing a treaty of friendship and mutual assistance in 1961.

Relations with Israel

When Madagascar gained independence as the Malagasy Republic in 1960, Israel was one of the first countries to recognize its independence, send an ambassador, and establish an embassy on the island. President Philibert Tsiranana of Madagascar and President Yitzhak Ben-Zvi of Israel each visited the other country during their terms. Bilateral relations were suspended after the Yom Kippur War in 1973. In 1992, Malagasy politician Raherimasoandro "Hery" Andriamamonjy Andriamamonjy founded Club Shalom Madagascar, an organization liaising diplomatic, cultural, and commercial relations between the two countries. Bilateral relations were restored in 1994. In 2020, Madagascar formed a parliamentary Israel Allies Caucus, chaired by Retsanga Tovondray Brillant de l’Or, as part of the Israel Allies Foundation.

See also

• Religion in Madagascar
• Lemba people
• Crypto-judaism
• Igbo Jews
• Kaifeng Jews
• Tudor Parfitt

External links

• Jewish Virtual Library website
• Jewish Photo Library images from Madagascar
• Faces of Africa: The Jews of Madagascar — Documentary short by CGTN Africa
• Journey to Judaism — Documentary short about the conversion of the Malagasy Sepharad Jews