1

Making Meaning Skin Deep: The Changing Valence of Henna in Jewish Culture
Noam Sienna, Concordia University, March 6, 2014
At a henna ceremony in Ohel Dar, a Yemenite synagogue in Jerusalem, February 14, 2010, I
recorded in my fieldnotes:
The family was called together for the spreading of the henna... [The organizer] explained that during the
spreading of the henna, the two mothers would put henna on the bride and groom and offer their blessings.
The two mothers put henna in the couples right hands; the bride had her henna put on while wearing a
plastic glove. I didnt have a chance to ask why (and nobody mentioned it), but I presume that it was either
because she didnt want it to show up at work or because she simply didnt like it
This simple gesture a lump of henna smeared into a gloved hand points towards a larger
shift in Jewish communal conceptions of hennas materiality. For centuries, Jewish communities
in North Africa, the Levant and Mediterranean basin, and Central and Southern Asia, used henna
on ceremonial occasions to mark and protect participants. The tangible henna itself was central to
the proper and successful performance of these rituals in multiple arenas: the substance of the
powdered leaves, the artistry of the henna patterns, and the lasting henna stain on the skin.
Today, while henna ceremonies have taken on renewed importance in contemporary Israel, the
role of the substance of henna is much less legible. This paper considers changing practices of
henna use in Jewish communities in their traditional contexts, in their interactions with colonial
powers, and after their mass immigration, or aliya, to Israel in the 1950s and 60s. After
introducing henna art and ritual, I explore the role of henna in Jewish ritual, beginning with its
importance in Jewish life in the 19th and early 20th centuries and moving chronologically
through aliya to the place of henna in Jewish life today.
2
Henna refers to a natural dye, made from the leaves of the henna plant, Lawsonia inermis, which
is grown throughout North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia. When henna paste is
applied to organic material, like skin, fingernails, hair, leather, or fabric, it leaves a permanent
stain, ranging from an orange-red to a deep purple in colour. When done on living bodies,
however, the processes of exfoliation and growth cause henna to fade from skin and grow out of
hair and nails. It is thus neither permanent, since it fades, nor temporary, since it cannot be
washed off or removed at will. Henna is used as a cosmetic, and also appears at various rituals of
passage and lifecycle events, such as births and weddings, as well as times of celebration and
holidays. While it is used to varying degrees by all cultures and religious groups living in the
region of henna cultivation, including Muslims, Hindus, Christians, Bahais, Zoroastrians, and
others, this paper focuses solely on henna traditions in Jewish communities.
Until the contemporary period, there were established henna customs among Jews in North
Africa, the Levant and Mediterranean basin, and Western, Central and Southern Asia.
1
Much of
hennas importance came from the beliefs associated with the plant itself, which transmitted what
is known in Hebrew as berakha, Arabic baraka blessedness. This quality is essential not only
in ensuring happiness and success but also in warding off negative forces and energies, variously
understood as demons (Hebrew shedim, Arabic jnun) or the Evil Eye (Hebrew ayin ha-ra). This
protective quality is understood to be inherent in the plant material itself, as it is in other
1. For an overview, see Sienna 2013.
3
substances (for example: iron, the rue plant, the number five, or the colours blue and red).
2
An
elderly Moroccan woman I interviewed explained that her father, a doctor and rabbinic scholar,
taught her that each plant has the name of an angel, an angel that tells it the job it has to do in
the world. The angel of the henna plant is Mevi-Mazal [Bringer of Luck]. That is the job of the
henna plant: to bring luck. That is why it was put in the world.
The protective qualities of henna are evident in practices which involved its physical presence.
For example, Rabbi Yosef Messas (1892-1974), a well-known North African rabbi, recorded the
following tradition in Tlemcen, Algeria, in 1924:
When an individual rented a house or shop, he would not move in until placing a small pile of henna, about
a handful, in the four corners of the building, and lighting four candles, on the evening before moving in.
He then would call on the spirits who lived in that place, imploring them to graciously accept the new
inhabitants, the neighbours who were preparing to come to live with them.
3
Similarly, one of my elderly interlocutors from Constantine, Algeria, remembered putting henna
on the doorstep of a new house with honey and milk, so that the inhabitants would always be
safe and happy. Offering henna to the jnun is a common theme in both Jewish and non-Jewish
communities in North Africa. At Jewish weddings in Morocco in the early 20th century, women
would throw henna in the corners of the room so that the spirits would not be jealous of the
bride, asking them to take the henna for themselves and do no harm to her.
4
In Sefrou, if a Jew
was being negatively affected by a spirit, they would prepare an offering of henna, coriander, oil,
and a scarf, and offer it to the spirit, saying: I offer this contract to you because I have wronged
2. Westermarck 1926; Stillman 1970.
3. Quoted in Zafrani 1969: 123
4. Malka 1946: 59
4
you. I am just like one of your children. Forgive me and pardon me. The coriander is for you, and
the henna is for your children.
5
Jewish homes in Morocco might have a khamsa, or stylized
hand, hennaed on the wall to protect the inhabitants.
6
Baghdadi Jews living in India put a
hennaed hand on the wall on the sixth or seventh night after a child's birth, to protect the
inhabitants of the house and especially the newborn.
7
Henna was not only a protective substance, but beautifying as well, and its predominant use is
for adornment. People paid special attention to the elegance of the patterns and the colour of the
stain, especially for significant occasions like weddings. In Persian Jewish communities, the
henna was carefully wrapped in special cloths (called hanaband) and left on overnight, to ensure
a dark colour.
8
One elderly Iranian woman recalled with laughter waking up in the middle of
night, panicking that one of her henna wrappers had fallen off. In San!a, Yemen, the henna was
applied in a series of stages lasting between two to four days, by a professional artist, known as a
shar!e, who used wax resist and layers of henna to create complex patterns with two or three
tones.
9
Among Jews in Djerba, the bride was also hennaed multiple times to ensure a good
colour, sometimes as many as eight times in a week. After the artist had hennaed her with
beautiful patterns, she slept with the henna overnight. In the morning, the other women came to
the brides house to check if the henna came out nicely; if it was good, they kissed her fingers
5. Stillman 1983: 492-493
6. Westermarck 1926: 123; Stillman 1970: 88
7. Hyman 1995: 110
8. Mizrahi 1959: 85
9. Sharaby 2006
5
and praised her beauty. If it was not to their satisfaction, they called the artist back to henna her
again.
10
This level of attention tells us how important the henna was it wasnt enough to just
have henna. The henna meant something; it had to be done right, it had to be beautiful.
The material of henna was treated with respect throughout the hennaing process. In many
communities, being chosen to mix the henna was an honour given only to a happily married
woman, preferably with children. An auspicious person was also chosen to apply the henna: for
brides, a woman never widowed or divorced;
11
for the grooms ceremony, the local rabbi was
often given the honour of beginning the henna application.
12
The material of the henna served as
a conduit for the blessings of the people mixing and applying it. Other relatives, including
parents and siblings, were also involved in the henna application and were hennaed themselves
before the other guests. It was considered an especially good omen for unmarried guests to
receive henna, and it was common in Kurdish and Indian communities to henna a young boy and
girl before the bride and groom; this served both as a decoy to confuse the Evil Eye, and a segula
[omen] to hasten their own weddings.
13
When it was time to remove the henna paste, that too was
done with care. In North African communities, guests were careful to remove their henna before
they left, so that they would not carry the happiness out of the brides home.
14
The couples henna
had special treatment, as my Algerian interlocutor explained:
10. Ben-Hur 1964: 35-37.
11. Malka 1946: 59
12. Smach 1910: 138
13. Brauer 1947: 102-103; Weil 1977: 217; Slapak 1995: 151
14. Allouche-Benayoun 1999: 206
6
After [the henna was applied], we would save it, we didnt throw out what was left... We saved the henna
that remained in a [vessel called a] !aifur. It would be wrapped up in cloth, and the bride, with her new
husband, would have to take it and dispose of it in a river, or if they lived near an ocean, they could do it
[there]. They disposed of it after the wedding, after everything was finished on Shabbat But it didnt
have to be the next day, it could be whenever they had the chance. It was just not permitted to throw the
[dried] henna in the garbage, you had to dispose of it in running water, you couldnt keep it. You disposed
of it [carefully], so that everything would be successful, so that the couple should succeed in life.
From beginning to end, the material of henna was central to these rituals. It protected the actors,
beautified the bride, and brought happiness and luck to the people celebrating. In many Jewish
communities, the material of henna was so strongly associated with celebration that sending a
package of henna symbolized the beginning of wedding festivities.
15
It even served as a sort of
wedding invitation: in Kurdish communities, henna was sent on a platter before a wedding to the
local Muslim chieftain, known as the agha if he accepted the henna, the wedding could take
place, but if relations were strained and he sent it back, the Jews would have to make peace with
him first before continuing with the wedding. Bowls of henna are then sent to the Kurdish
neighbours as an invitation to the wedding.
16
These rituals and traditions, like many other practices of bodily care and daily life, were
profoundly impacted by the encounter between European colonialism and the diverse cultures of
the Islamic world in the 18th-20th centuries. Numerous colonial travelers commented on the
prevalence of henna, describing the use of henna to adorn the body as disfiguring, dirty,
nasty, and to a European very disagreeable.
17
Already by the mid-19th century, it appeared
that henna was on its way out, especially in urban centres where there was heavy colonial
15. For examples, see Galant 1937: 106; Ben-Ami 1971: 13; Angel 1980: 120
16. Brauer 1947: 99
17. Melena 1850: 128; Russell 1756: 103-104
7
influence in fashion. Charles White, a British soldier stationed in Constantinople, observed in
1844 that the custom of tingeing the nails with henna has been abandoned by ladies of quality,
who for the most part adopted thread-gloves.
18
James Henry Skene, British consul in Aleppo,
reported in the Pharmaceutical Journal of Britain in 1873: The use of henna is on the decline
The use of it is thoroughly an oriental custom, and although women are still seen with their
hands and horses with their tails dyed with henna, its use is rapidly going out like other Eastern
fashions, which are receding as those of Europe advance.
19

This trend especially affected Jewish communities, who were particularly attuned to forces of
modernization and were often among the first groups to adopt Westernized outlooks and adapt
European-style customs.
20
One of my interlocutors recalled that even in her youth in the 1930s,
elaborate henna was not popular in the modern city of Constantine, under French influence:
[The henna artist] would put henna on the feet, on the soles, and she would draw all sorts of patterns,
intertwined like so, up to the ankle. And for those that wanted she would do it on the hands also, but we [in
Constantine] didnt want it. It was more those women living in the villages, they would do it on the hands,
but we [were] in the city, modern and all that we didnt want it. Even when it came to the feet, we would
ask [the henna artist] to do it just to the edge of the foot so that nobody would see it.
21

This concern with visibility is understandable: henna is hyper-visible as a bodily practice, and so
abandoning it would be at the forefront of the project of performing and perfecting the
appearance of European modernity. But additionally, the beliefs around the material of henna
18. White 1846: 195
19. Skene 1873: 189
20. Stillman 1995: 12-48 et passim
21. Compare the marriage of Selma Duek Sutton, Aleppo, 1922: The ceremonial swehnie, platters, were sent by the
groom to the bride-to-be with perfume and silken robes and owers [instead of henna]... In my time, henna was no
longer in vogue, Sutton 1988: 340; or Drowers note: Christians and Jews [in Baghdad] also follow this custom
[of the henna ritual] except when Westernized, 1938: 115.
8
its embodiment of baraka, its interaction with the world of the jnun did not easily fit into the
Western nation-model where, as Chakrabarty has shown for India, reason had to prevail over
all that was irrational and superstitious among its citizens.
22

In some cases, it appears that henna simply disappeared: in interviews with elderly Jewish
immigrants from Syria, Lebanon, Georgia, and Egypt, my interlocutors could not remember
seeing henna even in their youth. Rachel Amado Bortnick writes regarding the contemporary
Jewish community in Turkey that although henna ceremonies are now widely observed before
weddings, the henna has disappeared: the noche de alhenya, also known as kina geesi in
Turkish, is Henna Night in name only Gifts for the bride are brought, but there is no painting
of her hands with henna.
23
Matters are even more complicated in Israel, where the Jewish
encounter with colonial modernity was compounded by the encounter with the Israeli state and
its project of absorption through modernization directed at non-Ashkenazi bodies (since
Ashkenazim, presumably, needed only absorption).
24
For example, the following excerpt,
describing a Yemenite Jewish family in Israel in 1960, illustrates how traditions like henna were
contrasted to normative, unmarked, Ashkenazi, Israeli modernity:
I was just thinking about Yemen, Ibrahim said. Only ten years ago, and so much has changed. My
daughter marrying tomorrow in a plain white wedding gown. Its modern, she says. Its the way all
women in Israel get married. I married my first wife when she was eleven years old, and she was a woman.
And much later, when I married Saada, the painting of her hands alone took a long time. Now they dont
paint the hands any more when they get married it isnt modern, they say No, Ibrahim, Isaac said,
modern times are much better. Why do you think Naima wants to wear that white dress tomorrow instead
of an ancient Yemen gown? Because she has been taught what is good, because she has been to school and
22. Chakrabarty 2000: 237
23. Bortnick 1993: 97, 99
24. Shohat 1988: 22
9
because she can read and write. Ibrahim had to agree.
25
The visibility of henna marked the body not only as pre-modern, but also as non-Israeli, and in
particular, in the intermediate and anxiety-ridden position between the binary poles of Jew/
Ashkenazi/Israeli/Hebrew and non-Jew/Arab/Palestinian/Arabic.
26
The general neglect of the
henna ceremony began to shift in the early 80s, as the demands of non-Ashkenazi Israelis for
political and economic justice spilled over into social and cultural arenas. But if we return to the
Yemenite bride with whom the paper began, it is clear that the reconstituted henna ceremony has
changed significantly. The context and purpose is different: rather than comforting the frightened
bride and marking her departure from her parents house, it has become a celebration of ethnic
identity and pride in family roots. It even has a new name: the Hebrew "inna, or khinna, with the
novel plural "innot or khinnot, literally a henna.
27

The substance of henna, it would seem, has moved to the centre of the ritual which now bears its
name; and yet, even when the henna is still present, the function of the material is quite different.
Henna is absent from daily life, it is no longer deemed necessary to ward off spirits, and the
elaborate henna patterns once deemed so beautiful have been forgotten. The rituals surrounding
the application and removal of henna are gone: the henna is quickly and casually applied, washed
off or thrown out within the hour, and even, as presented in the beginning of the paper, applied
25. Waagenaar 1961: 23-24
26. Spolsky and Shohamy 1999: 115-155; Lefkowitz 2004: 213-235
27. In the Diaspora the wedding henna ceremony had various names (not to mention henna ceremonies for other
occasions): noche de alhenya among Mediterranean Sephardim, berberisca among Moroccan Sephardim, azmomeg
among Berber and Southern Moroccan Jewish communities, tahniyya in Algeria, leilat al-!inne in Yemen, khutba in
Baghdadi communities, and hanabandan in various Persian- speaking communities.
10
into a glove without contact with the skin. The henna remains important, however: the entrance
of the henna bowl is accompanied by loud cheers and spirited music and dancing. Furthermore, it
is still considered an honour to mix the henna: at several ceremonies the person who mixed it
(usually the grandmother) proudly told me so. The henna photo, with bride and groom in
traditional costumes holding up their palms smeared with henna, is a key moment. The henna
has become, paradoxically, both central and solely symbolic.
It is clear that the henna ceremony is still important, but in different ways. This paper has
attempted to demonstrate how the changes in the henna ceremony are based in shifting
conceptions of hennas materiality. Vanessa Ochs has pointed to how Jewish material culture
functions as both agents of change and, later, of stability.
28
When henna was the tangible
presence of baraka, celebration, and protection, the success of rituals depended on its correct
deployment. Today, for contemporary Jews, henna forms a bridge between them and a
mythologized narrative of their past and heritage. The power that henna once held has shifted
from the tangible material itself to the ceremony as a whole, and the protection henna once
offered against spirits has transformed to a generalized sense of the value of heritage. I conclude
with the observation of one of my Moroccan interlocutors, which brings together these ideas in
an affirmation of hennas continued power:
Why do henna? Henna is happiness. Thats the way it is. Henna is happiness, no more and no less. You start
your ceremonies with happiness. It makes people happy, it brings joy. As soon as you bring out the henna,
you already start saying, What fun! Am I right or not?
28. Ochs 2007: 108
11
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