According to legend, Bukharan Jews are the descendants of exiles who were members of the tribes of
Naphtali and
Issachar during the
Assyrian captivity, basing this assumption on a reading of "Habor" at II Kings 17:6 as a reference to Bukhara. However, modern day scholarship associate this legend with myths about the "
Ten Lost Tribes", which were propagated in
Europe. Historians trace their establishment in the region to the period following the conquest of
Babylonia by
Cyrus the Great, when it became part of the
Persian Empire. Cyrus granted all of the Jews citizenship and he also permitted them to return to the
province of Judah, however, a significant number of them chose to remain in
Mesopotamia and later, they dispersed themselves throughout the Persian Empire. According to some scholars, Jews may have settled in Central Asia as early as the sixth century, though it is certain that by the eighth to ninth centuries, they lived in Central Asian cities such as
Balkh,
Khwarezm, and
Merv. During this time, until approximately the 16th century, Bukharan Jews formed a culturally and religiously cohesive group with the
Jews of Iran and
Afghanistan. The first primary written account of the history of the Jews in Central Asia dates back to the beginning of the 4th century CE. It is recalled in the
Talmud by Rabbi Shmuel bar Bisna, a member of the Talmudic academy in
Pumbeditha, who traveled to Margiana (present-day Merv in
Turkmenistan). The presence of Jewish communities in Merv is also proven by Jewish writings on
ossuaries from the 5th and 6th centuries, which were uncovered between 1954 and 1956.
Under the rule of Tamerlane In the 14th century, in the
Timurid Empire ruled by
Tamerlane, Jewish weavers and dyers contributed greatly to his effort to rebuild Central Asia following
Genghis Khan and the
Mongol invasions. In the centuries following Timur's demise, Jews came to dominate the region's textile and dye industry.
Splintering of the Judeo-Persian communities ,
Iran and Jews from
Soviet Uzbekistan meeting in
Bukhara, Until the start of the 16th century, the Jews of Iran and Central Asia constituted one community. However, during the
Safavid dynasty, Iran adopted the
Shia branch of Islam, while Central Asia retained their allegiance to the
Sunni branch of Islam. Due to the hostile relationship between the neighboring states that developed because of this, the links between the Jews of the area were severed, and the Jewish community was divided into two similar but separate communities. From this point, the ethnonym and cultural identity of "Bukharan Jews" began to form. Other Jews from Iran and Afghanistan migrated during the Russian conquest of Central Asia as the Russians had extended greater freedoms and economic opportunities for Jews. However, when
Joseph Stalin and Soviet authorities consolidated their hold over the borders in Central Asia in the mid 1930s, living conditions for the Bukharan Jews deteriorated drastically, forcing a significant number of them to migrate to Iran or Afghanistan.
Under Sunni Muslim rule In the Khanate of Bukhara, Bukharan Jews lived under the status of
Dhimmi, and experienced a series of discriminatory practices from the Muslim majority. They were forced to wear clothing that identified them as Jews, such as a
yellow patch, a hat called a
Tilpak, and belts made of rope while the leather belts were reserved for Muslims. Jewish homes also had to be marked as "Jewish" with a dirty cloth nailed to their front doors, and their stores and homes had to be lower than Muslim ones. Despite these prohibitions and humiliations, the Jews were able to achieve financial success primarily as merchants and established lucrative trade businesses. During the 18th century, Bukharan Jews continued to face considerable discrimination and persecution. Jewish centers were closed down, and the Muslims of the region forced conversion on a significant number of Jews (over one-third, according to one estimate), under a threat of torture and agonizing execution. Some were killed for refusing to convert. Jews who forcibly converted were known as
Chalas, a term meaning "neither this nor that". By the middle of the 18th century, practically all Bukharan Jews lived in the
Bukharan Emirate. In the early 1860s,
Arminius Vambery, a Hungarian-Jewish traveler, visited the emirate disguised as a
Sunni dervish and noted in his journals that the Jews of Bukhara "live in utmost oppression, being despised by everyone."
Adoption of the Sephardic liturgy , the great-grandson of Rabbi Yosef Maimon In 1793, a missionary kabbalist named Rabbi
Yosef Maimon, who was a
Sephardic Jew originally from
Tetuan, Morocco, travelled to
Bukhara to collect/solicit money from Jewish patrons. It was during his search for funds that he chose to stay, in order to strengthen Judaism within the local Jewish population, who were said to be in a state of disarray. Prior to Maimon's arrival, the native Jews of Bukhara followed the Persian religious tradition. Maimon staunchly demanded that the native Jews of Bukhara adopt
Sephardic traditions. Many of the native Jews were opposed to this and the community split into two factions. The opposing faction was led by Rabbi Zacchariah ben Mashiah, who was originally from
Sanaa, Yemen. The followers of the Maimon clan eventually won the struggle for religious authority over the native Bukharans, and Bukharan Jewry forcefully switched to Sephardi customs. The supporters of the Maimon clan, in the conflict, credit Maimon with causing a revival of Jewish practice among Bukharan Jews which they claim was in danger of dying out. However, there is evidence that there were Torah scholars present upon his arrival to Bukhara, but because they followed the Persian rite their practices were aggressively rejected as incorrect by Maimon. Maimon's great-grandson
Shimon Hakham continued his great-grandfather's work as a Rabbi, and in 1870 opened the
Talmid Hakham yeshiva in Bukhara, where religious law was promoted. At that time Bukharan Jews were getting only a general education, which mostly consisted of religious laws, reading, writing and some math. Even though they studied
Torah, many Bukharan Jews did not speak fluent Hebrew. Only a few books were written in
Persian and many of them were old and incomplete. Hakham decided to change this situation by translating religious books into Bukhori. However, since there was no printing in Bukhara at that time, he went to
Jerusalem to print his books.
Under Imperial Russian rule n imperial territories of
Khiva,
Bukhara, and neighboring provinces in 1902–1903 In 1865, Russian colonial troops took over
Tashkent and established the
Russian Turkestan region as part of their expanding empire. Unlike the Jews of
Eastern Europe, Tsarist Russia was largely favorable towards the Jews living there. This was due to years of trade relations with the Bukharan Jews, resulting in their being viewed as potential allies in the region and as interpreters with the local authorities. As a Russian official explained in 1866: The Jew, who in Europe has lived for centuries in enmity with the Christian, welcomes him here with a shining gaze (...) and is delighted to be able to wave a greeting to him. He proudly regards him as his new friend, his protector. In his proximity, he looks down on the Mohammedan with contempt. Dubbed the "Golden Age" for Bukharan Jews, from 1876 to 1916 they were no longer restricted in their autonomy and had the same rights as their Muslim neighbors. Dozens of Bukharan Jews held prestigious jobs in medicine, law, and government, and many of them prospered. Many Bukharan Jews became successful and well-respected actors, artists, dancers, musicians, singers, film producers, and sportsmen. Several Bukharan entertainers became artists of merit and gained the title "People's Artist of Uzbekistan", "People's Artist of Tajikistan", and even (in the Soviet era) "
People's Artist of the Soviet Union". Many succeeded in the world of sport, with several Bukharan Jews in Uzbekistan becoming renowned boxers and winning many medals for the country.
Hibbat Zion and immigration to Ottoman Palestine Beginning from 1872, Bukharan Jews began to move into the region of
Ottoman Palestine, motivated by religious convictions and the desire to return to their ancestral homeland. The land on which they settled in
Jerusalem was named the
Bukharan Quarter (Sh'hunat HaBucharim) and still exists today. In 1890, seven members of the Bukharan Jewish community formed the
Hovevei Zion Association of the Jewish communities of Bukhara,
Samarkand and
Tashkent. The Bukharan Quarter was one of the most affluent sections of the city, populated by Bukharan Jewish merchants and religious scholars supported primarily by various trading activities such as
cotton,
gemstones, and
tea from Central Asia. Following World War I and the Bolshevik Revolution, the quarter fell into decline as sources of income from foreign trade became cut off leaving many residents with little more than just their homes in Jerusalem, forcing them to subdivide and rent out rooms to bring in income. From being lauded as one of the most beautiful neighborhoods in the city, the Bukharian Quarter earned the opposite sobriquet, of being one of the poorest neighborhoods of Jerusalem. In the 1920s and 1930s, the neighborhood also became one of the centers of the Zionist movement with many of its leaders and philosophers living there. Between 1953 and 1963, Rabbi
Bernard M. Casper was working as Dean for Student Affairs at the
Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and during this period he became deeply concerned about the impoverished Quarter. The quarter borders
Tel Arza on the west, the
Shmuel HaNavi neighborhood on the north,
Arzei HaBira on the east, and
Geula on the south. Today, most of the residents are
Haredi Jews.
Under Soviet rule 's Bukharan Quarter, in front of their
Sukkah, 1902 in
Tel Aviv, 1959 , c. 1970s Following the
Soviet capture of Bukhara and the creation of the Soviet Socialist Republics of
Uzbekistan and
Tajikistan, synagogues were destroyed or closed down, and were replaced by Soviet institutions. As a result, many Bukharan Jews fled to
the West. Stalin's decision to end Lenin's
New Economic Policy and initiate the
First five-year plan in the late 1920s resulted in a drastic deterioration of living conditions for the Bukharan Jews. By the time Soviet authorities established their hold over the borders in Central Asia in the mid 1930s, many tens of thousands of households from Central Asia had crossed the border into Iran and Afghanistan, amongst them some 4,000 Bukharan Jews who were heading towards
Mandatory Palestine. In 1950, the "Black Years of Soviet Jewry" began when suppression of the Jewish religion resumed after having paused due to World War II. After
Joseph Stalin's attempt to turn the newly founded state of
Israel into a socialist country failed, an anti-Israel, anti-Zionist, and antisemitic campaign launched against Soviet Jews. Several religious and prominent Bukharan Jews were arrested and sentenced to 25 years on charges of "Zionist propagation". After the creation of the state of
Israel in 1948, and later the
Six-Day Arab–Israeli War of 1967, antisemitism intensified amongst the Muslim majority, with the 1967 war leading to a rise in
Jewish patriotism. The Soviet Union forbade Jews to make
aliyah to Israel though these restrictions loosened in the 1970s and ceased in the 1980s.
Relationship with other Jewish communities After the Russian conquest of Central Asia, a small number of
Ashkenazi Jews emigrated from Eastern Europe and the European part of the Russian Empire to
Russian Turkestan. During
World War II, tens of thousands of Ashkenazi Jews from the European regions of the Soviet Union headed eastward to various Soviet republics in Central Asia, either as
refugees, or were forcefully deported there by
Joseph Stalin. In
Soviet Uzbekistan, the Bukharan Jewish communities helped contribute to the resettlement of these refugees, housing families in their homes and assisted them with finding jobs until they settled in to their new surroundings. Despite this, Bukharan and Ashkenazi Jews largely remained separate from one another, and intermarriage between the two was extremely rare. Bukharan Jews ranged from religious to traditional, and clustered together (particular those who lived in the Jewish Quarters), while most Ashkenazi Jews living in Central Asia were secular, both structurally and culturally, and assimilated into the general populace. Some Bukharan Jews viewed Ashkenazi Jews as inauthentic Jews, and looked down on them for their lack of Jewish identity. Both groups are also buried in separate cemeteries. However, Bukharan Jewry had good relations with the
Chabad-Lubavitch, beginning from the end of the 19th century with the arrival of Rabbi Shlomo Leib Eliezrov, a student of Rabbi
Sholom Dovber Schneersohn. Rabbi Eliezrov accepted a temporary rabbinical position in Uzbekistan and helped organize the provision of kosher meat in surrounding cities where Jews lived. Over the decades, other emissaries from Chabad would come to support the community as well. Some Bukharan Jews also have Sephardic ancestry, similarly from various migrations of Jews from
Syria,
Morocco, and
Turkey in the late 18th through 19th century.
Mass migration after 1991 In the late 1980s to the late 1990s, following the collapse of the Soviet Union and foundation of the independent Republic of
Uzbekistan in 1991, most of the remaining Bukharan Jews left Central Asia for the
United States,
Israel,
Europe, or
Australia in the last mass emigration of Bukharan Jews from their resident lands. Some left due to economic instability, while others left fearing growth of nationalistic policies in the country. The resurgence of
Islamic fundamentalism in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan (such as the
Fergana massacre and the
1990 Dushanbe riots) prompted an increase in the level of Jewish emigration. According to various Bukharan Jews, the Uzbek and Tajik locals would come to Jewish homes and say things in line with "Go back to where you came from. You don't belong here." Because of this, Jewish citizens also found it difficult to sell their homes at a reasonable price. In 1990, there were riots against the
Jewish population of
Andijan and nearby areas. This led to most Jews in the
Fergana Valley immigrating to Israel or the United States. ==Immigrant populations==