In this work, Brann gives an account of the origins and transformations of the intertwined tropes of Andalusi and Sefardi exceptionalism in Andalusi Arabic and Hebrew sources, ending with an overview of the post-medieval afterlife of these tropes in modern scholarship, film, music, and literature. His analysis combines close readings of Arabic and Hebrew sources, many of which have not been translated into English, a deep understanding of the socio-cultural background of the times, and strategic assists from concepts drawn from modern critical theory. The work is divided into an introduction, five chapters, and a conclusion in which the focus shifts to the modern reception of medieval tropes of Andalusi and Sefardi exceptionalism.

In Chapter 1: Geography and Destiny (21-44), Brann traces the geographic and eschatological tropes of Andalusi exceptionalism. He shows how “hyper-awareness of al-Andalus’ otherness...became permanent drivers and markers of Andalusi ‘self-fashioning,’ cultural politics, and collective memory” (23). Writers such as Ibn Habib stressed al-Andalus’ contact with Christianity as a defining characteristic, while others focused on its historical exceptionality (in contrast with the continuity and relative stability of the Eastern Caliphate), making it the “epicenter of an unconventional rendering of Islamic history” (29). Brann also explains that this was couched in terms of al-Andalus as a bastion Maliki fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence) and expressed through the particularly Andalusi genre of biographical dictionaries of Maliki scholarly genealogy (38). Writing across traditional geographical and eschatological genres, these writers all worked to shift al-Andalus to the center of the Islamic geographic system.

Chapter 2, “Without al-Andalus, There would be no Sefarad: The origins of Sephardi exceptionalism” (45-73) argues that Jewish Andalusis based their ideas of Sefardi exceptionalism on already existing tropes of Andalusi exceptionalism. They accomplished this both by stressing the exceptional nature of the individual accomplishments of Sefardi figures in Jewish intellectual pursuits as well as (according to them) their unprecedented success within the structures of the Muslim state, which they represented as “without parallel in Jewish history” (46). These writers inflect the origin story of the Andalusi Umayyad Caliphate in a Jewish key, focusing on the independence of North African and Andalusi rabbis from the Eastern academies, and their excellence in developing “new systematic religious thinking” (51) based on Arabic models. Here Brann argues that for Jewish Andalusi intellectuals, intellectual merit was fungible as social capital. “Transactional struggles over cultural capital...[shaped]...the politics of an emergent elite Andalusi Jewish society” (55), and paved the way for monumental innovations such as Moses Maimonides’ ground-breaking codification of Jewish law, the Mishneh Torah.

Chapter 3, “The Cultural Turn: Andalusi Exceptionalism Through Arabic Adab, Following the Collapse of the Unitary State” (74-105) describes how the tropes of Andalusi exceptionalism underwent a transformation after the dissolution of the Umayyad Caliphate and the formation of rival city-states, or taifas (Ar. tawa’if, literally ‘parties’). In this context, Andalusi writers reworked pre-Islamic tropes of nostalgia and longing as a specifically Andalusi longing for the intellectual and artistic greatness of the Caliphate. For them, Andalusi-ness was a sort of avatar for caliphal cultural superiority. Brann writes that these writers imagined a “virtual al-Andalus” (77) as a culture that was once under the banner of the caliphate becomes a nostalgic project in Taifas, Almoravid, and Almohad al-Andalus (and later Christian Iberia), as exceptional in its ruin as in its zenith. They reworked genres of scholarly biography to establish exceptional lineages of intellectual effort, and pointed toward inclusivity as a hallmark of Andalusi exceptionalism. This production of Andalusi group identity “manufactured continuity” and “virtual ’asabiyya (group cohesion)” (Brann 105).

In Chapter 4, “The Jerusalemite Exile that is in Sefarad: Sefardi Exceptionalism (Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries)” (106-138), Brann demonstrates how Jewish Andalusi writers adapt tropes of Andalusi exceptionalism in a Jewish context in ways that might appear counterintuitive to us. The theme of exile from al-Andalus cultivated by writers fleeing Almohad persecution, for example, becomes entangled with the trope of exile from the Land of Israel that is traditional to the Jewish liturgy in a sort of “parallax imaginative lens of [the] sacred” (107). Brann makes this argument in a study of Judah Halevi, Samuel Hanagid, and Moshe Ibn Ezra. For Brann, Halevi rejected Sefarad as only an Andalusi could, “[employing] all the culture’s linguistic, discursive, and intellectual tools against itself” (109). Brann sees Hanagid, vizier and general to the King of Granada, as “the embodiment of Sefardi exceptionalism” (124). His poetry built on genealogical tropes of Arabic shu‘ubiyya poetry to “‘authorize’ his...highly personal and idiosyncratic Hebrew songs” (121). Brann argues that Moshe ibn Ezra constructs Sefardi exceptionalism by “[valorizing] the Andalusi Jews’ lineage, learning, culture, and religious orthodoxy” (136).

In the final and fifth chapter, “Out of Place with Exceptionalism on the Mind: Sefardi and Andalusi Travelers Abroad (Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries)” (139-171), Brann turns his attention to how Andalusis sojourning abroad further develop establish tropes of Andalusi exceptionalism. He shows how these writers highlight examples of enlightened Christian and Muslim rulers to recall the Andalusi heyday against the background of the current political strife and cultural decline. In his letter to Joseph, King of the Khazars, Hasdai ibn Shaprut foreshadows Benjamin of Tudela’s messianic imagination of Jewish sovereignty by describing the Jewish Khazar kingdom in tropes of exceptionalism usually reserved for descriptions of al-Andalus. Brann writes of Judah al-Harizi as an Andalusi Jewish literary ambassador who “indoctrinate[d] Eastern literary intellectuals” with Sefardi tradition (163). For Brann, Al-Harizi follows Samuel Hanagid, Solomon Ibn Gabirol, Moses ibn Ezra, and Judah Halevi in negotiating Sefardi exceptionalism between the twin poles of al-Andalus/Sefarad and Jerusalem.

In the conclusion, “Andalusi, Sefardi, and Spanish Exceptionalism: Reclaimed, Embraced, Repudiated, Reimagined” (172-194), Brann gives an overview of how Andalusi tropes of exceptionalism have been reworked by modern writers, intellectuals, artists, and musicians. He writes that “al-Andalus and Sefarad (as well as Medieval Iberia) occupy a special place in the...imagination...for reasons having to do with their own time, place, sociopolitical circumstance, and cultural condition” (193).

This book is a very welcome contribution to Andalusi and Sephardic studies, coming from a distinguished scholar in the field. Brann has been at this game a long time, and it shows. He navigates between Arabic and Hebrew sources effortlessly, and is one of the eminent experts on their interaction in al-Andalus, as author of two previous monographs (The Compunctious Poet and Power in the Portrayal) as well a tall stack of articles and essays on the topic. [1] His writing is clear and engaging, and he is very skilled at seasoning his close readings with strategic bits of critical theory. The close readings of the sources are erudite but accessible, and he writes for an audience that may or may not have familiarity with the Arabic and Hebrew languages and literary traditions. He somehow avoids talking down to the specialist while not overwhelming the non-specialist. There are not really many nits to pick here. I suppose scholars of the modern Andalusi and Sefardi imaginary might find the conclusion a bit ambitious in its scope, but it’s clear that Brann intended this as a brief lit review and/or road map for future work rather than as a comprehensive study of the afterlife of Andalusi/Sefardi tropes of exceptionalism. Overall, Brann’s work is a valuable contribution to medieval Iberian studies and a pleasurable read to boot. It will be essential reading for students of medieval Iberian literature and culture, and very useful for those working in adjacent fields such as Arabic literature, Hebrew literature, Medieval Studies, History, and cultural studies.

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Notes

1. Ross Brann, The Compunctious Poet: Cultural Ambiguity and Hebrew Poetry in Medieval Spain(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, 1991); Power in the Portrayal: Representations of Jews and Muslims in Eleventh- and Twelfth-Century Islamic Spain (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002).