External Cultural Influences on the Jewish Community of Izmir r 289names that have joined together to do good, and have founded the
honorary committee.^19Influences on Jewish Music
Music was not new to the Izmir community, but it also witnessed some
innovations that had a direct impact on Muslim society. The songs of
Sephardic Jewry can be divided into two categories: religious songs sung
mainly in Hebrew and secular songs sung mainly in Ladino.
Religious Songs
Liturgical songs are sung in synagogues and at Jewish ceremonies such as
circumcision, bar mitzvahs, and weddings. The structure, style, and char-
acter of these melodies are derived from the Spanish musical heritage that
the expelled Jews brought with them to the Ottoman Empire from Spain.
Selihot (penitential prayers recited in the weeks preceding Yom Kippur)
and piyyutim of the High Holy Days are sung to these melodies. Other
melodies were composed after the Spanish Expulsion or were borrowed
from their host culture. These were meant to inspire the people and in-
still knowledge and love of Torah and Mitzvot (commandments) in their
hearts. Holidays, Jewish values, religious leaders, and holy objects were
all themes.
These songs were first sung in Hebrew, but later in Ladino, due to the
efforts of a small group of rabbis and poets, including Rabbi Avraham
Toledo, Rabbi Chaim Yom Tov Magola, and Rabbi Avraham Assa. Their
goal was to strengthen the weak spiritual level of the people, who no lon-
ger knew Hebrew and could not read holy texts written in this language.^20
They wrote and translated books on Jewish law and ethics as well as li-
turgical poetry into Ladino. One example is a poem entitled Komplas De
Yosef HaTzaddik (Poems in Honor of Joseph the Righteous). Songs were
composed in Ladino honoring those who journeyed to the Holy Land to
pray at the graves of Tzaddiqim (righteous) or Jews who wished to end
their days there and be buried in its holy earth.
By the nineteenth century the masses could no longer read Hebrew,
and the educated elite read French or Italian. The translation of piyyutim,