Kurdish Jews
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Kurdish Jews | |
|---|---|
| Total population | 160,000 |
| Regions with significant populations | United States: nn
Israel: |
| Language | *Liturgical: Mizrahi Hebrew *Traditional: Kurdish, Aramaic dialects *Modern: typically the language of whatever country they now reside in, including Modern Hebrew in Israel |
| Religion | Judaism |
| Related ethnic groups | • Jews • Mizrahi Jews |
Kurdish Jews (Hebrew: יהדות כורדיסתאן, "Jews of Kurdistan", Kurdish: Kurdên cû) are the ancient Jewish communities inhabiting the region today known as Kurdistan, roughly covering parts of Iraq, Iran, Armenia, and Syria. Their garb and culture is similar to neighbouring Muslim Kurds.
There is some evidence of very old bonds between Jewish People and Kurds. Tradition holds that Jews first arrived in the area of modern Kurdistan after being captured by the Assyrian empire in Judah and relocated back to the capital of Assyria. The illustrious royal house of Adiabene, with Arbil (Arbala in Aramaic, Hewlêr in Kurdish) as its capital, was converted to Judaism in the course of the 1st century BC, along with, it appears, a large number of Kurdish citizens in the kingdom (see Irbil/Arbil in Encyclopaedia Judaica). The name of the king Monobazes (related etymologically to the name of the ancient Mannaeans), his queen Helena, and his son and successor Izates (derived from yazata, "angel"), are preserved as the first proselytes of this royal house. (See "Brauer E., The Jews of Kurdistan, Wayne State University Press, Detroit, 1993" ,"Louis Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews, 5th CD. Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1968,VI.412" and [1]).
Rabbi Asenath Barzani, who lived in Mosul (present-day Iraq), from 1590 to 1670 was among the very first Jewish women to become a Rabbi. She was the daughter of the illustrious Rabbi Samuel Barzani. Until the modern era, very few women were given the title of "Rabbi". But sometimes a woman’s wisdom and learning were so exceptional that this title was given to her.(See [2]). She belonged to the mystical school of Kabbalah. In the Jewish Folklore and mystic tradition, it is said that she whispered God’s secret name and saved the synagogue in Amadiyah (in Iraqi Kurdistan) from burning down. In another source, it is said that, "Asenath Barzani in sixteenth-century Kurdistan supplicates the Torah sages of Amadiya so she can support the yeshiva her husband established in Mosul until her young son could take over"(see [3]). The tombs of Biblical prophets like Nahum in Alikush, Jonah in Nabi Yunis (ancient Nineveh), Daniel in Kirkuk, and several caves reportedly visited by Elijah are among the most important Jewish shrines in Kurdistan and are venerated by all Jews today.[4]. The Jews of Kurdistan lived—until their immigration to Israel in the early 1950s—as a closed ethnic isolate, mostly in northern Iraq and Iran and in eastern Turkey. According to an old tradition, the Jews of Kurdistan are descendants of the Ten Tribes from the time of the Assyrian exile in 723 B.C. (Roth C, Encyclopedia Judaica. Keter, Jerusalem, pp 1296–1299,1972).
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[edit] References
- Asenath, Barzani, "Asenath's Petition", First published in Hebrew by Jacob Mann, ed., in Texts and Studies in Jewish History and Literature, vol.1, Hebrew Union College Press, Cincinnati, 1931. Translation by Peter Cole.
- Yona Sabar, The Folk Literature of the Kurdistani Jews (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982.
- Hasan-Rokem, G. , Hess, T. and Kaufman, S., Defiant Muse: Hebrew Feminist Poems from Antiquity: A Bilingual Anthology, Publisher: Feminist Press, 1999, ISBN 1-55861-223-8. (see page 65, 16th century/Kurdistan and Asenath's Petition)
- Berkovic, S., Straight Talk: My Dilemma as an Orthodox Jewish Woman, Ktav Publishing House, 1999, ISBN 0-88125-661-7.
- Rabbi Asenath Barzani in Jewish Storytelling Newsletter, Vol.15, No.3, Summer 2000
- Kurdish Jewry (יהדות כורדיסתאן) An Israeli site on Kurdish Jewry. (in Hebrew)
- The Jews of Kurdistan Yale Israel Journal, No. 6 (Spr. 2005).
- Hadassah Magazine, Nov. 2003
- Towards a Sephardic Jewish Renaissance
- Judaism in Encycopaedia Kurdistanica
- Schwartz, Howard. The Day the Rabbi Disappeared. Jewish Holiday Tales of Magic. Illustrated by Monique Passicot. Viking, 2000. ISBN 0-67-088733-1. $15.99. 80 pp.
- Kurdish Jews; who are they? (Swedish)
