TORONTO — Yiddish isn’t the only Jewish language that’s threatened by extinction, Solly Lévy, left, warns.

Lévy, a Sephardi Jew born in Tangiers, Morocco, who forged careers in teaching, consulting, playwriting, acting, and cantorial singing, was in Toronto earlier this month to promote his second book, El Libro de Selomo, which is written in Hakétia, a largely extinct Jewish Moroccan language.

At a Nov. 2 event held at Petah Tikva Congregation, Lévy read excerpts from his book and spoke about the history of the 500-year-old language.

The audience was also treated to a screening of A Sephardic Journey, a documentary by Donald Winkler about Lévy himself, through his own words, the words of his family and friends, and his students.

Lévy, who emigrated to Montreal in 1968, when Moroccan Jews were being targeted following Israel’s victory in the Six Day War, said Hakétia is vulnerable because unlike Ladino, the Judeo-Spanish language, which has been  written and published for centuries, Hakétia is largely oral.

Switching back and forth from Spanish to English, Lévy first explained the difference between Ladino – a Spanish dialect influenced by Hebrew and Aramaic, Arabic, Turkish and to a lesser extent Greek and spoken by Jews who lived in the Ottoman Empire – and Hakétia, a mix of old Spanish, Hebrew and Arabic, which was spoken on the northeast coast of Morocco.

“But the mere fact that I am addressing you in international Spanish and in English is a strong indication of the social status of Hakétia,” he said.

“If I use this dialect – my mother tongue, of my grandmothers, my ancestors – in a serious academic talk, people will simply laugh at me.”

He said that Jewish scholars from northern Morocco never wrote in Hakétia because, in spite of the Spanish Inquisition in 1492 when Jews were forced to convert or were expelled, Jews always felt a cultural link with Spain and wanted to write in the best Spanish of their times.

“This was strengthened by [Morocco’s] geographical proximity, of course, to Spain, and on the other hand by the Spanish colonization of northern Morocco, established by the Treaty of Fez in 1912 and ending in 1956, the year of the declaration of Moroccan independence,” Lévy said.

He said that Hakétia was considered the “language of the kitchens, able only to express emotions, never sophisticated enough to become a noble, highly intellectual form of communication.”

He said it was considered a language the “underprivileged used to curse or bless, laugh or cry. The so-called high class citizens in our community did not allow their children to speak Hakétia. It was only recently, too late, that the baby boomers from northern Morocco showed some interest, or rather [paid] lip service, to the dialect of their elders.”

Lévy spoke about a two-week cultural event in Paris last February that celebrated Moroccan Judaism.

Although there were lectures, concerts, discussions, art exhibits and film screenings about Moroccan Judaism,   there was “not one single word about the northern Moroccan Jews. Not one single word about us. The word Hakétia was never pronounced nor written, not even once during those 14 days,” he said.

“Even our own brothers, Moroccan Jews at large and Sephardim, do not know us, do not recognize our right to be recognized.”

Before reading excerpts from his book, which had the audience laughing throughout, he urged members of his community to do what they can to preserve their heritage.

“Please do not forget your roots. Think about your roots and try to improve your Spanish, and do not relinquish the other part of the Jewish Moroccan culture.”