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Serach (Khazar)
In the Schechter Letter, Serach ( he, סרח) is the wife of the Khazar ruler Sabriel. A Jew, she encourages her husband and other Khazars to convert to Judaism and establish it as the official religion of Khazaria. Serach is not mentioned in the Khazar Correspondence or the Kuzari. Some scholars have postulated that the Khazar conversion to Judaism came as a result of contact with existing Jewish populations in the Crimea and the Caucasus, possibly the ancestors of the Krymchaks or Mountain Jews. As with so much of Khazar studies, the absence of documentary evidence renders the question of whether Serach belonged to one of these groups a matter of speculation. Sources *Kevin Alan Brook. ''The Jews of Khazaria, Third Edition''. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2018. *Norman Golb and Omeljan Pritsak Omeljan Yosypovych Pritsak ( uk, Омелян Йосипович Пріцак; 7 April 1919, Luka, Sambir County, West Ukrainian People's Republic – 29 May 2006, Bosto ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Schechter Letter
The "Schechter Letter" (also called the "Cambridge Document") was discovered in the Cairo Geniza by Solomon Schechter. The Letter The Schechter Letter has been interpreted as a communique from an unnamed Khazar author to an unidentified Jewish dignitary. Some believe that the Schechter Letter was addressed to Hasdai ibn Shaprut by a Constantinopolitan Khazar after his first, unsuccessful attempt to correspond with the Khazar king Joseph (see Khazar Correspondence). However recent historiography has noted the names echoing Jewish mystical traditions and lack of any corroborating historical sources to its account may place it in a tradition of fantastical writing about the lost tribes of Israel. The Letter was included in the Genizah Collection donated by Schechter to Cambridge University in 1898. Sadly, most of the folio is unreadable and only two surviving blocs of text exist. This makes identifying the precise nature of the letter, communique or legend unclear. The conversion ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Khazar
The Khazars ; he, כּוּזָרִים, Kūzārīm; la, Gazari, or ; zh, 突厥曷薩 ; 突厥可薩 ''Tūjué Kěsà'', () were a semi-nomadic Turkic people that in the late 6th-century CE established a major commercial empire covering the southeastern section of modern European Russia, southern Ukraine, Crimea, and Kazakhstan. They created what for its duration was the most powerful polity to emerge from the break-up of the Western Turkic Khaganate. Astride a major artery of commerce between Eastern Europe and Western Asia, Southwestern Asia, Khazaria became one of the foremost trading empires of the Early Middle Ages, early medieval world, commanding the western March (territory), marches of the Silk Road and playing a key commercial role as a crossroad between China, the Middle East and Kievan Rus'. For some three centuries (c. 650–965) the Khazars dominated the vast area extending from the Volga-Don steppes to the eastern Crimea and the northern Caucasus. Khazari ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bulan (Khazar)
Bulan was a Khazar king who led the conversion of the Khazars to Judaism. His name means " elk" or "hart" in Old Turkic. The date of his reign is unknown, as the date of the conversion is hotly disputed, though it is certain that Bulan reigned some time between the mid-8th and the mid-9th centuries. Nor is it settled whether Bulan was the Bek or the Khagan of the Khazars. The renowned scholar D. M. Dunlop was certain that Bulan was a Khagan; however, more recent works, such as ''The Jews of Khazaria'' by business studies student and amateur researcher Kevin Brook, assume that he was the Bek due to references to him leading military campaigns. Khazar tradition held that before his own conversion, Bulan was religiously unaffiliated. In his quest to discover which of the three Abrahamic religions would shape his own religious beliefs, he invited representatives from each to explain their fundamental tenets. In the end, he chose Judaism. In the Khazar Correspondence, King Josep ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Religious Conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a set of beliefs identified with one particular religious denomination to the exclusion of others. Thus "religious conversion" would describe the abandoning of adherence to one denomination and affiliating with another. This might be from one to another denomination within the same religion, for example, from Baptist to Catholic Christianity or from Sunni Islam to Shi’a Islam. In some cases, religious conversion "marks a transformation of religious identity and is symbolized by special rituals". People convert to a different religion for various reasons, including active conversion by free choice due to a change in beliefs, secondary conversion, deathbed conversion, conversion for convenience, marital conversion, and forced conversion. Proselytism is the act of attempting to convert by persuasion another individual from a different religion or belief system. Apostate is a term used by members of a religion or denomination to refer to so ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Judaism
Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in the Middle East during the Bronze Age. Modern Judaism evolved from Yahwism, the religion of ancient Israel and Judah, by the late 6th century BCE, and is thus considered to be one of the oldest monotheistic religions. Judaism is considered by religious Jews to be the expression of the covenant that God established with the Israelites, their ancestors. It encompasses a wide body of texts, practices, theological positions, and forms of organization. The Torah, as it is commonly understood by Jews, is part of the larger text known as the ''Tanakh''. The ''Tanakh'' is also known to secular scholars of religion as the Hebrew Bible, and to Christians as the " Old Testament". The Torah's supplemental oral tradition is represented by later texts s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Khazar Correspondence
The Khazar Correspondence is a set of documents, which are alleged to date from the 950s or 960s, and to be letters between Hasdai ibn Shaprut, foreign secretary to the Caliph of Cordoba, and Joseph Khagan of the Khazars. The Correspondence is one of only a few documents attributed to a Khazar author, and potentially one of only a small number of primary sources on Khazar history. The authenticity of the correspondence has been challenged, on the grounds that it has little in common with the otherwise attested chronology, language, borders and economy of the Khazars at the time. Ostensibly it gives both account of the Khazar conversion to Judaism and of its progress in subsequent generations, as well as potentially showing that within a generation of the fall of the Khazar empire in 969, the Khazar state was still militarily powerful and received tribute from several polities.The Jew in the Medieval World: A Sourcebook, 315-1791, (New York: JPS, 1938), 227-232 Background The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kuzari
The ''Kuzari'', full title ''Book of Refutation and Proof on Behalf of the Despised Religion'' ( ar, كتاب الحجة والدليل في نصرة الدين الذليل: ''Kitâb al-ḥujja wa'l-dalîl fi naṣr al-dîn al-dhalîl''), also known as the Book of the Khazar ( he, ספר הכוזרי: ''Sefer ha-Kuzari''), is one of the most famous works of the medieval Spanish Jewish philosopher and poet Judah Halevi, completed in the Hebrew year 4900 (1139-40CE). Originally written in Arabic, prompted by Halevi's contact with a Spanish Karaite, it was then translated by numerous scholars, including Judah ben Saul ibn Tibbon, into Hebrew and other languages, and is regarded as one of the most important apologetic works of Jewish philosophy. Divided into five parts (''ma'amarim'' – articles), it takes the form of a dialogue between a rabbi and the king of the Khazars, who has invited the former to instruct him in the tenets of Judaism in comparison with those of the other tw ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crimea
Crimea, crh, Къырым, Qırım, grc, Κιμμερία / Ταυρική, translit=Kimmería / Taurikḗ ( ) is a peninsula in Ukraine, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, that has been occupied by Russia since 2014. It has a population of 2.4 million. The peninsula is almost entirely surrounded by the Black Sea and the smaller Sea of Azov. The Isthmus of Perekop connects the peninsula to Kherson Oblast in mainland Ukraine. To the east, the Crimean Bridge, constructed in 2018, spans the Strait of Kerch, linking the peninsula with Krasnodar Krai in Russia. The Arabat Spit, located to the northeast, is a narrow strip of land that separates the Sivash lagoons from the Sea of Azov. Across the Black Sea to the west lies Romania and to the south is Turkey. Crimea (called the Tauric Peninsula until the early modern period) has historically been at the boundary between the classical world and the steppe. Greeks colonized its southern fringe and were absorbed by the Ro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caucasus
The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, mainly comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and parts of Southern Russia. The Caucasus Mountains, including the Greater Caucasus range, have historically been considered as a natural barrier between Eastern Europe and Western Asia. Mount Elbrus in Russia, Europe's highest mountain, is situated in the Western Caucasus. On the southern side, the Lesser Caucasus includes the Javakheti Plateau and the Armenian highlands, part of which is in Turkey. The Caucasus is divided into the North Caucasus and South Caucasus, although the Western Caucasus also exists as a distinct geographic space within the North Caucasus. The Greater Caucasus mountain range in the north is mostly shared by Russia and Georgia as well as the northernmost parts of Azerbaijan. The Lesser Caucasus mountain range in the south is occupied by several independent states, mostly by Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, but also ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Krymchaks
The Krymchaks ( Krymchak: , , , ) are Jewish ethno-religious communities of Crimea derived from Turkic-speaking adherents of Rabbinic Judaism.Krymchaks at the They have historically lived in close proximity to the , who follow . At first ''krymchak'' was a Russian descriptive used to differentiate them from their [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mountain Jews
Mountain Jews or Caucasus Jews also known as Juhuro, Juvuro, Juhuri, Juwuri, Juhurim, Kavkazi Jews or Gorsky Jews ( he, יהודי קווקז ''Yehudey Kavkaz'' or ''Yehudey he-Harim''; russian: Горские евреи, translit=Gorskie Yevrei, az, Dağ Yəhudiləri) are Jews of the eastern and northern Caucasus, mainly Azerbaijan, and various republics in the Russian Federation: Chechnya, Ingushetia, Dagestan, Karachay-Cherkessia, and Kabardino-Balkaria. The Mountain Jews are the descendants of Persian Jews from Iran. Mountain Jews took shape as a community after Qajar Iran ceded the areas in which they lived to the Russian Empire as part of the Treaty of Gulistan of 1813. The forerunners of the Mountain Jewish community were in Ancient Persia from the 5th century BCE; their language, called Judeo-Tat, is an ancient Southwest Iranian language which integrates many elements of Ancient Hebrew."Mountain Jews: customs and daily life in the Caucasus'', Leʼah Miḳdash-Shema" ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Norman Golb
Norman Golb (15 January 1928 – 29 December 2020) was the Ludwig Rosenberger Professor in Jewish History and Civilization at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. Golb was born in Chicago, Illinois, United States, on 15 January 1928 to Joseph and Rose Golb, child immigrants from Ukraine. He earned his PhD from Johns Hopkins University in 1954. While a student he had fellowships to do studies at Dropsie College in Philadelphia and another that ended up with him spending from 1955-1957 studying at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He joined the faculty of the Hebrew Union College, Cincinnati in 1958 before settling at the University of Chicago, where he has worked since 1963. Golb has also been a visiting scholar at the University of Wisconsin (1957–58), Harvard University (1966), and Tel Aviv University (1969–70). Golb was a key proponent of the viewpoint that the Dead Sea Scrolls found in Qumran were not the product of the Essenes, but rather of many dif ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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