Food in Society and the Tales

In a peasant society that relies on labor-intensive agriculture on limited land, and in which the size of an individual household could be thirty or more, food is the most important material resource at the family's disposal. The cultivation, consumption, storage, sale, and distribution of food are the family's primary concerns and take up the greatest portion of its time. It is therefore not surprising that food assumes such an important role in the tales, and not merely as nourishment but as a motivator for the action in some and a source of metaphor and symbol in others. The titles of four tales refer to foods: "Jummez," a type of fig (12); "Jbene," cheese (13); "Chick Eggs" (28); and "Pomegranate Seeds" (35). In Tale 12 the name of the food is also that of the hero, and in 13 and 35 it is that of the heroine - and in all three the symbolic association of food imagery with sexuality is fairly clear. Food is the basic motivator of action in all the "Environment" tales in Group IV, and it figures prominently in several others as well (e.g., Tales 1, 9, 14, 15, 27, 29, 34, 36, 45). In its symbolic aspect food has magical properties, being used, for example, to make a woman conceive, as in Tales 6 and 28. The symbolic figures of ghouls and ghoulehs have as their most outstanding characteristic an insatiable appetite. As metaphor, food in the tales designates a state of well-being and satisfaction, especially when available in abundance, as in Tales 29, 43, and 44. It is also used as a sign of love (Tales 14, 15).

In using food and the processes associated with it - from growing and storing it to eating and then defecating - to generate metaphor and symbol, the tales accurately reflect cultural attitude and practice. Although consumed collectively, food, like all other material goods belonging to the family, is considered the property of the patriarch, and his permission must be sought before it is given away. The patriarch's authority in this respect extends even to mother's milk, which belongs not to her but to her husband. Thus she may not nurse another woman's baby without his permission. (Actually, the concern here may be less over the loss of the milk than over the fact that milk siblings, who will likely be first cousins, are forbidden by religious law from marrying each other.)

The distribution of food is the responsibility of the patriarch's wife, and it represents her authority in the family. If the family is small, its members eat together, but if large, she divides the food among them. The proper message of that division, which children are taught from a very early age, is fairness to all. Sometimes, however, food is distributed not according to need but according to position in the family hierarchy. The family, for example, may wish to honor its head by serving him food prepared separately and with better ingredients than those used for the rest of the family. If the food is prepared in the same way for all, the patriarch is usually given first preference and served the best pieces of meat. Certain situations, of course, call for special treatment without attracting attention. Invalids are served rich meat broths to help them recover (Tale 22), even though the rest of the family may not taste meat more than three or four times a year. Newlyweds are also favored, as exemplified in the wedding feasts at the ends of many tales. On their wedding night the groom's mother brings the couple dinner, appropriately called the "mouthful of happiness" (luqmit is-saade); she will also bring them a good breakfast the next morning. They may receive this special treatment for a few days, but if it goes on too long the other members of the family will begin to complain. A pregnant woman who craves a particular food can also reasonably expect her craving to be satisfied (Tale 2). It is up to her mother-in-law to see to her desires, and although this is not done openly, no one minds much if the women are found out. After giving birth, too, a mother may be served meat dishes for several days (Tale 24), if the family can afford it; and if the newborn is a boy, the mother may be favored more openly and for a longer period of time.

The very importance of food production in the family economy and the emphasis placed on fair distribution make it an ideal tool for showing favor. Although not necessarily scarce, food was not always plentiful, as we see in Tale 29, where the family crosses the river into Trans-Jordan in search of food. Two contradictory forces are at work here: the love (and need) of Palestinian fellahin for large families on the one hand, and the limited productivity of land parcels that were becoming smaller with each succeeding generation on the other. Clearly, then, the extended-family ethic of equal treatment is based not only on the utilitarian imperative of keeping the family together but also on objective conditions of near scarcity. Favoritism in food distribution is thus not an act that could be easily overlooked, and its occurrence beyond the relatively few permissible occasions outlined above can lead to envy, jealousy, and conflict. Those who conspire in this favoritism are considered traitors to the collective interests of the family and thieves who allocate to themselves a resource that rightfully belongs to all.

Those singled out for favor through food appreciate its value as a sign of love. The giving and sharing of food are associated with the expression of love in all its forms. Mothers use food to establish special relationships with their children; young men bring sweets when visiting their intended brides; and newlyweds use food on the first night of marriage to help break the ice. In the tales, as in life, the rituals of love are always accompanied by rituals of food (e.g., Tales 10, 14, 15). There is in fact a whole corpus of tales and jokes concerning the theme of illicit love in which the affair is always discovered as a result of missing food. (Indeed, when food starts to, disappear from a house, an affair is always suspected.) A common expression people use when faced with a confusing situation, "Is this the cat or the meat?," has its origin in one such tale, in which the husband brings home two kilograms of meat and asks the wife to prepare it. The meat, however, disappears; she claims that the cat ate it, whereupon he, taking hold of the cat and weighing it, discovers it weighs two kilograms. Turning to his wife, he asks, "If this is the cat, where's the meat? And if this is the meat, where's the cat?"

Food is also important outside the confines of the extended family. Two of the most basic values of Arab culture, hospitality and generosity, are expressed through the giving or sharing of food. Hospitality is shown to all guests (Tale 41), who were traditionally welcome for three days with no questions asked. In the tales, even the hostile ghoulehs show hospitality to the aspiring young hero. Even today a poor family might slaughter its best lamb or go into debt in order to show hospitality to a visitor. The guesthouse (madafe), where strangers were received, was a feature of Palestinian villages and towns well into the period of the British Mandate. The ideal form of generosity is to give food to someone who cannot be expected to reciprocate, such as a beggar or a poor family - and to ensure that reciprocation is not even attempted, those who wish to exercise the purest form of generosity will give anonymously, usually during major religious festivals.

Food is also used to give other messages, entailing less noble motives. In competing for prestige, a family may take advantage of the numerous ceremonial occasions that present themselves to prepare huge feasts, offering much more food than their guests can possibly eat. They thus seek not reciprocation, but a general recognition of their generosity on the part of the community, and comparison with other prominent families. Such splurging and shows of wealth are even more striking when the competition is for power. By offering an individual or family a big feast, the host puts them under the social obligation of having to reciprocate. If they do not, they incur a social debt; but if they do, the competition could continue with the exchange of even bigger feasts.

All major stages in the life of an individual or a family, whether in joy or in mourning, are celebrated with the sharing of food. Among these occasions are the birth of a son (Tale 18), his circumcision or first communion, his marriage (several of our tales end with a wedding feast), the raising of a roof on a house, or the death of a family member. On this last occasion food is also given as alms to the poor on behalf of the soul of the deceased (Tale 45). Other occasions include dinner invitations for the sake of establishing a relationship of friendship between two families, for exploring the possibilities of nasab (in-laws), and for sealing a reconciliation (sulha) between two warring families. The sharing of food, in short, is a regular and very important feature of Palestinian social life, forming an important link in the bonds that give the society its coherence and its distinctive character. This importance is accurately reflected in the tales, although the emphasis there, by the genre's nature, is more on romantic than social relationships.