The Afterlives of Publishing: Christian Texts for Indian Jewish Song

Abstract

When Bene Israel women in Mumbai gather after Shabbat services, they sing Marathi songs learned from mothers, aunts, and friends. These songs are transmitted orally, but many have origins that are neither oral nor Jewish. Central to this repertory are Psalms in Marathi meters, composed by Christian missionaries and published in the early nineteenth century. I consider how these Christian texts were colored by Hindu devotional song, and how they have been re-oralized by Bene Israel women to bolster their Jewish knowledge, generate new forms of sociability, and articulate changing Bene Israel identities.