Neither judeo-masonic conspiracy nor philosemitism: the discursive ambivalence of the Hispano-Jewish cultural encounter in North African lodges

Abstract

Documentation requisitioned by the Franco regime from North African masonic lodges was used to justify the accusation of a Jewish-Masonic conspiracy, leading to repression of members of the institution. However, the Spanish-Jewish reality of these freemasons, their goals and projects were far from warranting such incrimination. This study reviews the Jewish presence in Spanish lodges in Morocco to determine whether it was decisive in the construction of the Spanish Masonic discourse that prevailed until the Second Republic, and whether, in addition, it was conditioned by the (re)construction of Spanish and Jewish identities in a context marked by evolutionary theories, philosephardism, antisemitism and Zionism. Consequently, documentation from Maghrebi lodges are used to quantify and gauge the Hispanic-Jewish “cultural encounter” to detect particularities, possible frictions and acquiescence in this interaction which we consider go beyond Masonic philosemitism, lodge discourse and the catastrophist myth of conspiracy.