Jews of Central Asia

 

Bukharan Jews are a sub-ethnic Jewish group residing mostly in Central Asia, in the towns of Uzbekistan and the adjacent republics, as well as in Russia, Israel and the United States. The name comes from the Bukharan Emirate, a former feudal Moslem state in the territory of today's Uzbekistan and named after the capital, the city of Bukhara.


Bukharan Jews around 1890


The Bukharan Jews speak Judeo-Tajic, a language related to Persian. This is a dialect of the Tajik language, which is spoken in the area between the Syrdar'ya and the Amudar'ya rivers.

No definitive statistics are available on the Bukharan Jews, as the statistical data on the Jewish population of Central Asia and the Caucasus are largely approximations. In the mid-nineteenth century, Bukharan Jews in Central Asia numbered around 10,000. The population increased to c. 16,000 at the turn of the twentieth century and to 20,000 in the 1910s. Despite the massive aliyah in the I970s, the population of c. 30,000 Bukharan Jews in Central Asia remained stable because of the high birth rate in the 1960s and 1970s. In the past decade, massive emigration by Bukharan Jews to Israel and the United States has considerably decreased the numbers living in their traditional surroundings. Certain communities of Bukharan Jews have even disintegrated. Unfortunately, no current statistics are available.

The largest communities of Bukharan Jews in Uzbekistan were located in Samarkand, Tashkent (capital of Uzbekistan), Bukhara, Shakhrisabz, Kattakurgan, Karmana, Khatyrchi, as well as in the cities of the Fergana Valley.

Jews are known to have lived in Central Asia since the Achaemenid period in Iran. Throughout the Middle Ages, the Jewish population was repeatedly documented in this area, the center of ancient civilizations and part of the Great Silk Road. But both Bukharan and Afghani Jews drifted away from the overall Jewish population of Khorasan (Eastern Iran) rather late. This process, which began in the sixteenth and continued until the eighteenth century, severed contacts between the Jews of Eastern Iran and those of Central Asia. Bukharan Jews therefore represent one of the most recent sub-ethnic groups of all the Jewish communities. The full cycle of ethnogenesis (i.e. the separation of Bukharan Jews from their Iranian and Afghan counterparts) has not been completed, as the resemblances between ritual art from synagogues in Central Asia, Iran and Afghanistan indicate.

A Jewish mahalla (quarter) is an integral part of many cities in Central Asia. Life in a compact and nationally homogeneous quarter guarantees all families support from their neighbors and safety, which has become more important in recent years; it also ensures continuity of religious traditions. The population of a Jewish quarter conforms to a hierarchy based on families and clans. Endless joint celebrations strengthen local ties: commemorative ceremonies, engagements, weddings and circumcisions.

Bukharan Jews tend to follow all the life cycle rituals of circumcision, weddings and funerals. Observance of other religious rituals depends largely on the city, whether there is a Jewish mahalla, and whether the individual concerned lives in the mahalla or in a modern apartment complex. Nevertheless, Bukharan Jews are generally involved in religious activities. Most Jewish communities - even fairly small ones - have a minyan in the synagogue every morning.

The community has an elected secular leader, known as the kalantar. Previously, the kalantar served as a judge and as the community's representative before the gentile authorities. Today this individual is primarily the religious head of the Jewish community and supervises the synagogue and the quarter's self-government. His main concerns are maintenance and upkeep. A hakham used to be the religious leader of a Jewish community (the equivalent of rabbi in an Ashkenazi community). The last local hakham died in the early 1980s. Today, a shohet or kalantar retains sole responsibility for the community. New rabbis - educated in yeshivas, some from Israel - are arriving.