Jean-Claude Lasry is an academic and prolific writer on the Sephardic community. A leader of the Sephardic community during its formative years, one of his foremost accomplishments was his role in establishing the École Maïmonide, Canada’s first Jewish school with French-language instruction.
Lasry arrived in Montreal in 1957 as a member of the third Moroccan Jewish family to settle in the city following Morocco’s independence and increasingly difficult conditions for Jews. Lasry became intrigued by issues of social integration and reception of the new wave of immigrants, both from the established anglophone Ashkenazic Jewish community and the surrounding French community. These topics served as both the focus of much of his future research and as motivation for his community involvement.
The arrival of Sephardim (North African and Middle Eastern Jews) in the 1950-1970s was met with uncertainty by the majority Anglophone Ashkenazic community (of Central and East European origin) and disbelief from the surrounding French Canadian population, who were accustomed to English-speaking Jews. Demands for independent institutions that would enable the preservation of their Sephardic identity were often met with challenges from the two dominant communities.
Because Quebec’s confessional public school system reserved French schools for Catholics, Sephardic parents were compelled to send their children to English Protestant schools. Parents were forced to choose between forfeiting their language or their Jewish identity, a problem Lasry addressed as chair of the Association sépharade francophone’s education committee. In 1968, along with Haïm Hazan and Judah Castiel (who would become École Maïmonide’s first president), Lasry presented their case to the Quebec Minister of Education, Jean-Guy Cardinal, and to Yves Martin of the Commission des écoles catholiques de Montreal. After several consultations, École Maïmonide was successfully established. Montreal’s Sephardic community has since developed a comprehensive network of agencies, with Lasry playing an important role in establishing several parallel services and institutions. Most notably, Lasry served in 1972–1974 as president of the Association Sépharade francophone, a precursor to today’s Communauté sépharade unifiée du Québec (CSUQ).
To address the intra-community tensions that formed along Sephardic and Ashkenazic lines, Lasry helped launch the Comité des relations ashkénazes-sépharades (SARC) in 1985. A joint project of the Allied Jewish Community Services (now called the Federation CJA), the Centre communautaire juif of the YM-YWHA, and the Communité sépharade du Québec, this initiative set an important precedent to better unite and integrate the Jewish community. The community continues to work at reinforcing ties between the two cultural groups.
Jean-Claude Lasry is currently a professor of psychology at the Université de Montréal. He has become a nationally renowned expert on mental health for immigrants integrating into Canadian society and on the quality of life of cancer patients.
Compiled by Marian Pinsky
Sources
“History.” Federation CJA.
Gabay, Joseph. “Ma communaute à la une, le congrès, la csq…et les autres.” 50 ans ensemble: Le livre sepharade 1959-2009. Ed. David Bensoussan. Montreal: Communaute sepharade unifiee Sepharade Unifiee du Quebec. 2010. 194-7.
King, Joe. "Les Sepharades: The Other Children of Abraham in the Ashkenazi Domain." From the Ghetto to the Main: the Story of the Jews of Montreal. Montreal: Montreal Jewish Publication Society, 2000. 255-62.
Lasry, Jean-Claude. "A Francophone Diaspora in Quebec." The Canadian Jewish Mosaic. Eds. M. Weinfeld, W. Shaffir, and I. Cotler. Toronto: J. Wiley & Sons Canada, 1981. 221-40.
Lasry, Jean-Claude. "Mobilite professionnelle chez les immigrants juifs nord-africains à Montreal." International Review of Applied Psychology 29 (1980): 17-30.
Lasry, Jean-Claude. "Sephardim and Ashkenazim in Montreal." Contemporary Jewry 6.2 (1983): 26-33.
Levy, Joseph, and Yolande Cohen. "Moroccan Jews and Their Adaptation to Montreal Life." Renewing Our Days: Montreal Jews in the Twentieth Century. Eds. Ira Robinson and Mervin Butovsky. Montreal: Vehicule, 1995. 95-118.
Levy, Joseph J., and Leon Ouaknine. "Les Institutions communautaires des Juifs marocains à Montreal." Les Juifs du Maghreb: diasporas contemporaines. Eds. Jean-Claude Lasry and Claude Tapia. Montreal: Presses de L’Universite de De Montreal, 1989. 55-78.
Levy, Joseph J., and Yolande Cohen. "Moroccan Jews and Their Adaptation to Montreal Life." Renewing Our Days: Montreal Jews in the Twentieth Century. Eds. Ira Robinson and Mervin Butovsky. Montreal: Vehicule, 1995. 95-118.
*Image courtesy of the Canadian Jewish Congress Charities Committee National Archives.
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- Jean-Claude Lasry – École Maïmonide (1969-1972)