Jews of Nigeria: An Afro-Judaic Odyssey

Africa scholar Miles (Hausland Divided: Colonialism and Independence in Nigeria and Niger) examines a burgeoning new community in a mostly Muslim and Christian, but “intensely religious” country: Jewish converts among Nigeria’s ethnic Igbos, a group the author respectfully dubs “Jubos” and counts at about 20,000 strong. West African Judaism (as opposed to the long-established presence in East Africa) is a contemporary phenomenon; indeed, Miles calls Jubos “probably the world’s first Internet Jews.” Their shared faith unites an otherwise diverse community—which makes do with Internet cues, photocopied siddurs, and Coke-bottle menorahs while facing assimilation troubles, internal discord, and difficulties achieving state recognition (from both Nigeria and Israel). In addition to his firsthand account of a Jubo Hanukkah and, two years later, a Jubo bar mitzvah, the author collects a series of testimonials from (mostly male) converts. A short postscript describes a meeting with the great Nigerian author Chinua Achebe, who is intrigued but otherwise adds nothing substantive to the discussion. The author’s closeness to his subjects and hosts makes him perhaps too inclined to take their religious fervor at face value, making for a less than hardheaded approach to the Jubo phenomenon. The Jubos force reconsideration of histories and some basic categories of identity, and will likely be most provocative to professing Jews and scholars of religion or anthropology. (Mar.)