During their long and difficult history, Jews have repeatedly been subjected to various persecutions in many countries of the world. Fleeing from their pursuers, representatives of the once united people scattered over the centuries to different parts of Europe, Asia and North Africa. One group of Jews as a result of long wanderings arrived on the territory of Dagestan and Azerbaijan. These people created an original culture that absorbed the traditions and customs of different peoples.
They call themselves juuru
The ethnonym "Mountain Jews", which has become widespread in Russia, cannot be considered completely legitimate. So these people were called by the neighbors to emphasize their difference from the rest of the representatives of the ancient people. Mountain Jews call themselves dzhuur (in the singular - dzhuur). Dialect forms of pronunciation allow such variants of the ethnonym as "zhugur" and "gyivr".
They cannot be called a separate people, they are an ethnic group formed in the territories of Dagestan and Azerbaijan. The ancestors of the Mountain Jews fled to the Caucasus in the 5th century from Persia, where representatives of the tribe of Simon (one of the 12 tribes of Israel) lived from the 8th century BC.
Over the past few decades, most of the Mountain Jews have left their native lands. According to experts, the total number of representatives of this ethnic group is about 250 thousand people. Most of them now live in Israel (140-160 thousand) and the USA (about 40 thousand). There are about 30 thousand Mountain Jews in Russia: large communities are located in Moscow, Derbent, Makhachkala, Pyatigorsk, Nalchik, Grozny, Khasavyurt and Buynaksk. About 7 thousand people live in Azerbaijan today. The rest are in various European countries and Canada.
Do they speak a dialect of the Tat language?
From the point of view of most linguists, Mountain Jews speak a dialect of the Tat language. But the representatives of the tribe of Simonov themselves deny this fact, calling their language Juuri.
To begin with, let's figure it out: who are the Tats? These are people from Persia who fled from there, fleeing wars, civil strife and uprisings. They settled in the south of Dagestan and in Azerbaijan, like the Jews. Tat belongs to the southwestern group of Iranian languages.
Due to the long neighborhood, the languages of the two above-mentioned ethnic groups inevitably acquired common features, which gave specialists a reason to consider them as dialects of the same language. However, Mountain Jews consider this approach fundamentally wrong. In their opinion, Tat influenced the Juuri in the same way that German influenced Yiddish.
However, the Soviet government did not delve into such linguistic subtleties. The leadership of the RSFSR generally denied any relationship between the inhabitants of Israel and the Mountain Jews. Everywhere there was a process of their tatization. In the official statistics of the USSR, both ethnic groups were counted as some kind of Caucasian Persians (Tats).
Currently, many Mountain Jews have lost their native language, switching to Hebrew, English, Russian or Azerbaijani, depending on the country of residence. By the way, representatives of the Simonov tribe have had their own written language for a long time, which in Soviet times was first translated into Latin, and then into Cyrillic. Several books and textbooks were published in the so-called Jewish-Tat language in the 20th century.
Anthropologists are still arguing about the ethnogenesis of the Mountain Jews. Some experts rank them among the descendants of the forefather Abraham, others consider them a Caucasian tribe that converted to Judaism in the era of the Khazar Khaganate. For example, the famous Russian scientist Konstantin Kurdov, in his work “Mountain Jews of Dagestan”, which was published in the Russian Anthropological Journal of 1905, wrote that Mountain Jews are most close to the Lezgins.
Other researchers note that the representatives of the Simonov tribe, who settled in the Caucasus long ago, are similar to Abkhazians, Ossetians, Avars and Chechens in their customs, traditions and national clothes. The material culture and social organization of all these peoples are almost identical.
Mountain Jews lived for many centuries in large patriarchal families, they had polygamy, and it was necessary to pay bride price for a bride. The customs of hospitality and mutual assistance inherent in neighboring peoples have always been supported by local Jews. Even now they cook dishes of Caucasian cuisine, dance lezginka, perform incendiary music, characteristic of the inhabitants of Dagestan and Azerbaijan.
But, on the other hand, all these traditions do not necessarily indicate ethnic kinship, they could be borrowed in the process of long-term coexistence of peoples. After all, the Mountain Jews have retained their national characteristics, the roots of which go back to the religion of their ancestors. They celebrate all major Jewish holidays, observe wedding and funeral rites, numerous gastronomic prohibitions, and follow the instructions of the rabbis.
The British geneticist Dror Rosengarten analyzed the Y chromosome of Mountain Jews in 2002 and found that the paternal haplotypes of this ethnic group and other Jewish communities largely coincide. Thus, the Semitic origin of the Juuru is now scientifically confirmed.
Fight against Islamization
One of the reasons that allowed the Mountain Jews not to get lost among other inhabitants of the Caucasus is their religion. Firm adherence to the canons of Judaism contributed to the preservation of national identity. It is noteworthy that at the beginning of the 9th century, the class top of the Khazar Khaganate - a powerful and influential empire located in the south of modern Russia - adopted the faith of the Jews. This happened under the influence of representatives of the tribe of Simonov, who lived on the territory of the modern Caucasus. By converting to Judaism, the Khazar rulers received the support of the Jews in the fight against the Arab invaders, whose expansion was stopped. However, the kaganate still fell in the 11th century under the onslaught of the Polovtsians.
Having survived the Mongol-Tatar invasion, for many centuries the Jews fought against Islamization, not wanting to give up their religion, for which they were repeatedly persecuted. Thus, the troops of the Iranian ruler Nadir Shah Afshar (1688-1747), who repeatedly attacked Azerbaijan and Dagestan, did not spare the Gentiles.
Another commander who, among other things, sought to Islamize the entire Caucasus was Imam Shamil (1797-1871), who opposed the Russian Empire, which asserted its influence on these lands in the 19th century. Fearing extermination by radical Muslims, the Mountain Jews supported the Russian army in the fight against Shamil's detachments.
Growers, winemakers, merchants
The Jewish population of Dagestan and Azerbaijan, like their neighbors, is engaged in gardening, winemaking, weaving carpets and fabrics, leatherworking, fishing and other crafts traditional for the Caucasus. There are many successful businessmen, sculptors and writers among the Mountain Jews. For example, one of the authors of the monument to the Unknown Soldier, erected in Moscow near the Kremlin wall, is Yuno Ruvimovich Rabaev (1927-1993).
In Soviet times, the writers Khizgil Davidovich Avshalumov (1913-2001) and Mishi Yusupovich Bakhshiev (1910-1972) reflected the life of fellow countrymen in their work. And now books of poems by Eldar Pinkhasovich Gurshumov, who heads the Union of Caucasian Writers of Israel, are being actively published.
Representatives of the Jewish ethnic group on the territory of Azerbaijan and Dagestan should not be confused with the so-called Georgian Jews. This sub-ethnos arose and developed in parallel and has its own original culture.
Mountain Jews - this is the name of a sub-ethnic group of Jews (descendants of Iranian Jews), immigrants from the North and East Caucasus. Until the middle of the 19th century, they lived in the south of Dagestan and the north of Azerbaijan, after which they settled in other regions and in Israel.
General information about Mountain Jews
Persia became the homeland of the Mountain Jews, who lived there around the 5th century. The language of the people is Mountain Jewish from the group of Jewish-Iranian languages. Also, representatives of this people speak Hebrew, Russian, Azerbaijani, English and other languages. Differences from Georgian Jews lie in the field of culture and linguistics.
The prayer book of the people is the siddur "Rabbi Ychiel Sevi". Its basis is the Sephardic canon, according to the custom of the Mountain Jews.
Officially, there are about 110,000 Mountain Jews. The main group - 50 thousand, lives in Israel. 37 thousand in Azerbaijan, 27 thousand in Russia, including 10 thousand in Moscow. About 10 thousand live in Dagestan, as well as in Germany, America and other countries.
The people are divided into seven local groups: Nalchik, Kuban, Kaitag, Derbent, Cuban, Shirvan, Vartashen, Grozny.
History of the Mountain Jews
Jews began to migrate to Eastern Transcaucasia from Iran and Mesopotamia in the middle of the 6th century. They settled among groups that spoke Tat. There is an assumption that this is due to the uprising of Mar Zutra II in Iran, which was suppressed at the same time as the Mazdakit movement. The participants began to settle in the Derbent region. The Jewish settlements in the Caucasus became the source of the emergence of Judaism in the Khazar Khaganate. Later they were joined by Iranian, Iraqi and Byzantine immigrants.
The villages of the Mountain Jews were located between Kaitag and Shamakhi. The first found monuments of this people date back to the 16th century. In 1742, Jews fled from Nadir Shah, in 1797-1799 from Kazikumukh Khan. Pogroms of internecine strife and conversion to Islam bypassed the Jews due to the entry of the Caucasus into Russia. In the middle of the 19th century, Jews began to settle wider than their ethnic territory.
For the first time, Mountain Jews began to communicate with Ashkenazi Jews in the 1820s. At the end of the 19th century, Jews moved to Palestine. Mountain Jews, in the amount of 25.9 thousand people, were first officially counted in the 1926 census.
In the 1920s and 1930s, literature, art, and the press began to develop. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the place of residence of the people was Dagestan. They settled in the villages of Ashaga-arag, Mamrash, Khadzhal-kala, Khoshmenzil, Aglobi and others. Attempts were made to resettle part of the people in the Kizlyar region, for which resettlement settlements were set up: named after Larin and named after Kalinin. In 1938, the Tat language became one of the official languages in Dagestan. In the 1930s, the organization of mountain-Jewish collective farms began on the territory of the Crimea and in the Stavropol Territory (Kursk region).
The Holocaust at the end of 1942 caused the death of most of the population. The inhabitants of the Caucasus were able to avoid Nazi persecution. After the war, the official use of the Hebrew-Tat language ceased. Only in 1956 was the annual “Vatan Sovetimu” published again, and the policy of “tatization” was carried out. Mountain Jews, who live mainly in Dagestan, began to be included in the reports of official statistics as Tats. It was the largest community of this people in the RSFSR.
In the 90s of the last century they settled in Israel, Moscow and Pyatigorsk. Small communities remain in Dagestan, Nalchik and Mozdok. The village of Krasnaya Sloboda (Azerbaijan) has become a place of recreation of the traditional way of life of this people. Settlements began to be created in the USA, Germany, Austria. The Moscow community includes several thousand people.
Traditional culture of Mountain Jews
In the second half of the 19th century, Mountain Jews were mainly engaged in gardening, growing tobacco, viticulture and winemaking, fishing, leather crafts, trading, mainly in fabrics and carpets, and also working for hire. One of the occupations is the cultivation of madder in order to obtain red dye. The social organization of the Mountain Jews is very close to the organization of the Caucasian peoples.
Until the beginning of the 1930s, about 70 people lived in the settlements: three to five large patriarchal families, each lived in a separate courtyard and in their own house. Families that descended from a common ancestor were part of tukhums. Polygamy, bride price, engagement in childhood, customs of help and blood feud were practiced.
In large cities, they settled in separate quarters or in the suburbs. There were two levels of the rabbinic hierarchy. Dayan Temir-Khan-Shura was recognized as the chief rabbi of the Mountain Jews of the North Caucasus, the dayan of Derbent was recognized as the rabbi of southern Dagestan and Azerbaijan in the middle of the 19th century. Mountain Jews are faithful to Jewish rituals that are associated with the life cycle.
Mountain Jews Tats
Mountain Jews in language and other characteristics belong to the community of Persian-speaking Jews, some groups of which are settled in Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asia (Bukharian Jews). The Jews of Eastern Transcaucasia received the name "Mountain" in the 19th century, when in official Russian documents all Caucasian peoples were called "Mountain". Mountain Jews refer to themselves as "Eudi" ("Jew") or Juur (cf. Persian juhud - "Jew"). In 1888, I. Sh. Anisimov, in his work “Caucasian Mountain Jews”, pointing to the proximity of the language of the Mountain Jews and the language of the Caucasian Persians (Tats), concluded that the Mountain Jews are representatives of the “Iranian Tats tribe”, which is still in Iran converted to Judaism and subsequently moved to Transcaucasia.
Anisimov's conclusions were picked up in Soviet times: in the 30s. the widespread introduction of the idea of the “Tat” origin of the Mountain Jews began. Through the efforts of several Mountain Jews close to power, a false thesis began to unwind that the Mountain Jews are “Judaized” Tats who have nothing to do with Jews. Because of the unspoken oppression, the Mountain Jews themselves began to record themselves on tatami.
This led to the fact that the words "tat" and "Mountain Jew" became synonymous. The erroneous name of the Mountain Jews "tatami" entered the research literature as their second or even first name. As a result, the entire layer of culture that was created under Soviet rule by Mountain Jews (literature, theater, etc.) in the Mountain Jewish dialect was called “Tat” - “Tat literature”, “Tat theater”, “Tat song” and etc., although the Tats themselves had nothing to do with them.
Moreover, a comparison of the dialect of the Mountain Jews and the Tat language and the physical and anthropological data of their speakers also completely excludes their ethnic unity. The grammatical structure of the dialect of the Mountain Jews is more archaic compared to the Tat language proper, which greatly complicates complete mutual understanding between them. In general, the archaism of the base is characteristic of all “Jewish” languages: for the Sephardic language (Ladino) it is Old Spanish, for the Ashkenazi language (Yiddish) it is Old German, etc. Moreover, all of them are saturated with words of Hebrew origin. Having switched to the Persian language, the Jews, however, retained in their dialect a layer of borrowings from the Aramaic and Hebrew (Hebrew) languages, including those not related to Jewish ritualism (gyosi - angry, zoft - resin, nokumi - envy, Guf - body , keton - canvas, gezire - punishment, govle - deliverance, boshorei - good news, nefes - breath, etc.). Some phrases in the language of the Mountain Jews have a structure that is characteristic of the Hebrew language.
In 1913, the anthropologist K. M. Kurdov measured a large group of residents of the Tat village of Lahij and revealed a fundamental difference between their physical and anthropological type (the average value of the head index is 79.21) and the type of Mountain Jews. Other researchers also took measurements of the Tats and Mountain Jews. The average values of the head index of the Tats of Azerbaijan range from 77.13 to 79.21, and of the Mountain Jews of Dagestan and Azerbaijan - from 86.1 to 87.433. If the Tats are characterized by meso- and dolichocephaly, then for the Mountain Jews - extreme brachycephaly, therefore, there can be no talk of any relationship between these peoples.
In addition, data on dermatoglyphics (the relief of the inner side of the palm) of the Tats and Mountain Jews also completely exclude their ethnic proximity. It is obvious that the speakers of the Mountain Jewish dialect and the Tat language are representatives of different ethnic groups, each with its own religion, ethnic identity, self-name, way of life, material and spiritual culture.
Tats and Armenians. In sources and publications of the XVIII-XX centuries. the inhabitants of a number of Tat-speaking Armenian villages in Transcaucasia were mentioned under the terms "Tats-Armenians", "Armenian-Tats", "Tats-Christians" or "Tats-Gregorians". The authors of these works, not taking into account the fact that the inhabitants of these Tat-speaking villages themselves identify themselves as Armenians, put forward a hypothesis that a part of the Persians of Eastern Transcaucasia had adopted Armenian Christianity in the past.
Tats and the Tati people in Northwestern Iran. The name "tati", since the Middle Ages, in addition to Transcaucasia, was also in use in the territory of Northwestern Iran, where it was applied to almost all local Iranian languages, with the exception of Persian and Kurdish. At present, in Iranian studies, the term "tati", in addition to the name of the Tati language, which is closely related to Persian, is also used to designate a special group of northwestern Iranian dialects (chali, danesfani, khiaraji, hoznini, esfarvarini, takestani, sagzabadi, ebrahimabadi, ashtehardi, khoini, Kadzhali, Shahrudi, Kharzani), common in Iranian Azerbaijan, as well as to the southeast and southwest of it, in the provinces of Zanjan, Ramand and in the vicinity of the city of Qazvin. These dialects show a certain closeness to the Talysh language and are considered together with it as one of the descendants of the Azeri language.
The use of the same name "Tati" to two different Iranian languages gave rise to the misconception that the Tats of Transcaucasia also live compactly in Iran, which is why in some sources, when indicating the number of Tats, the people of the same name in Iran were also indicated.
Notable representatives of Mountain Jews
Among the famous representatives of the Mountain Jews are representatives of culture and art, singers, actors, directors, screenwriters, poets, writers, playwrights, historians, doctors, journalists, academicians, businessmen, etc.
Abramov, Efim - director, screenwriter.
Abramov Gennady Mikhailovich (1952) - actor, singer, theater of the Moscow Jewish Theater "Shalom", laureate of international festivals.
Avshalumov, Khizgil Davidovich (1913-2001) - Soviet prose writer, poet, playwright. He wrote in Mountain Jewish and Russian. Laureate of the S. Stalsky Prize.
Adam, Ehud (Udi) (b. 1958) - Major General of the Israel Defense Forces, son of Y. Adam.
Amiramov, Efrem Grigorievich (b. 1956) - poet, composer, singer.
Anisimov, Ilya Sherebetovich (1862-1928) - ethnographer.
Babakishiyeva, Ayan - Azerbaijani singer.
Gavrilov, Mikhail Borisovich (1926) - Honored Worker of Culture of Dagestan, writer, poet, editor-in-chief of the Vatan newspaper (Dagestan), first editor-in-chief of the Kavkazskaya Gazeta (Israel).
Davydova, Gulboor Shaulovna—(1892-1983). Viticulturalist of the collective farm. Kaganovich. She was awarded the title of Hero of Socialist Labor in 1966 for growing high yields of grapes. In the Great Patriotic War, two sons of Davydova, David and Ruvin, died. Agro-farm is named after Gulboor Davydova.
Izgiyaev, Sergei Davidovich (1922-1972) - Soviet mountain Jewish poet, playwright and translator.
Izrailov, Tankho Selimovich (1917-1981) - People's Artist of the USSR, choreographer.
Ilizarov, Asaf Sasunovich (1922-1994) - linguist.
Ilizarov, Gavriil Abramovich (1921-1992) - a famous trauma surgeon.
Illazarov, Isai Lazarevich (1963) - General Director of the Dance Ensemble of the Peoples of the Caucasus "VATAN". Israel is the grandson of the Hero of the Soviet Union Isai Illazarov, named after his grandfather at birth. In Moscow in 2011, the Autonomous Non-Profit Organization "Center of National Cultures" named after the Hero of the Soviet Union Isai Illazarov was registered, whose task is to preserve and maintain a favorable international climate in Moscow and Russia.
Isaakov, Benzion Moiseevich (Pencil) - the largest manufacturer in the USSR, philanthropist.
Ismailov, Telman Mardanovich - Russian and Turkish businessman, former co-owner of the Cherkizovsky market.
Mardakhaev, Binyamin Talkhumovich - Entrepreneur, Honorary Builder of Russia (2009).
Mirzoev, Gasan Borisovich - Academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Doctor of Law, Deputy Chairman of the Committee for State Construction of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, President of the Guild of Russian Lawyers.
Matatov, Ehiil Ruvinovich (1888-1943) - public and statesman, linguist.
Mushailov, Mushail Khanukhovich (1941-2007) - painter, member of the Union of Artists of the USSR and Israel.
- Nisan, Bella Alexandrovna - ophthalmologist.
Nisanov, Khayyam - Azerbaijani singer.
Nuvakhov, Boris Shamilevich - Head of the Research Center, Rector of the Academy of Management of Medicine and Law, Academician of the Russian Academy of Medical and Technical Sciences, Honorary Citizen of the city of Derbent, Advisor to the President of the Russian Federation.
Prigozhin, Iosif Igorevich (b. 1969) - Russian producer.
Rafailov, Rafoy - People's Artist of Chechnya.
Semendueva, Zoya Yunoevna (b. 1929) - Jewish Soviet poetess.
Solomonov, Albert Romanovich - Israeli football coach.
Hadad, Sarit (Sara Khudadatova) is an Israeli singer.
Tsvaygenbaum, Israil Iosifovich (b. 1961) - Soviet, Russian and American artist.
Yusufov, Igor Khanukovich - Minister of Energy of Russia (2001-2004).
Yarkoni, Yaffa (1925-2012) (maiden name Abramov) - Israeli singer.
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During their long and difficult history, Jews have repeatedly been subjected to various persecutions in many countries of the world. Fleeing from their pursuers, representatives of the once united people scattered over the centuries to different parts of Europe, Asia and North Africa. One group of Jews as a result of long wanderings arrived on the territory of Dagestan and Azerbaijan. These people created an original culture that absorbed the traditions and customs of different peoples.
They call themselves juuru
The ethnonym "Mountain Jews", which has become widespread in Russia, cannot be considered completely legitimate. So these people were called by the neighbors to emphasize their difference from the rest of the representatives of the ancient people. Mountain Jews call themselves dzhuur (in the singular - dzhuur). Dialect forms of pronunciation allow such variants of the ethnonym as "zhugur" and "gyivr".
They cannot be called a separate people, they are an ethnic group formed in the territories of Dagestan and Azerbaijan. The ancestors of the Mountain Jews fled to the Caucasus in the 5th century from Persia, where representatives of the tribe of Simon (one of the 12 tribes of Israel) lived from the 8th century BC.
Over the past few decades, most of the Mountain Jews have left their native lands. According to experts, the total number of representatives of this ethnic group is about 250 thousand people. Most of them now live in Israel (140-160 thousand) and the USA (about 40 thousand). There are about 30 thousand Mountain Jews in Russia: large communities are located in Moscow, Derbent, Makhachkala, Pyatigorsk, Nalchik, Grozny, Khasavyurt and Buynaksk. About 7 thousand people live in Azerbaijan today. The rest are in various European countries and Canada.
Do they speak a dialect of the Tat language?
From the point of view of most linguists, Mountain Jews speak a dialect of the Tat language. But the representatives of the tribe of Simonov themselves deny this fact, calling their language Juuri.
To begin with, let's figure it out: who are the Tats? These are people from Persia who fled from there, fleeing wars, civil strife and uprisings. They settled in the south of Dagestan and in Azerbaijan, like the Jews. Tat belongs to the southwestern group of Iranian languages.
Due to the long neighborhood, the languages of the two above-mentioned ethnic groups inevitably acquired common features, which gave specialists a reason to consider them as dialects of the same language. However, Mountain Jews consider this approach fundamentally wrong. In their opinion, Tat influenced the Juuri in the same way that German influenced Yiddish.
However, the Soviet government did not delve into such linguistic subtleties. The leadership of the RSFSR generally denied any relationship between the inhabitants of Israel and the Mountain Jews. Everywhere there was a process of their tatization. In the official statistics of the USSR, both ethnic groups were counted as some kind of Caucasian Persians (Tats).
Currently, many Mountain Jews have lost their native language, switching to Hebrew, English, Russian or Azerbaijani, depending on the country of residence. By the way, representatives of the Simonov tribe have had their own written language for a long time, which in Soviet times was first translated into Latin, and then into Cyrillic. Several books and textbooks were published in the so-called Jewish-Tat language in the 20th century.
Anthropologists are still arguing about the ethnogenesis of the Mountain Jews. Some experts rank them among the descendants of the forefather Abraham, others consider them a Caucasian tribe that converted to Judaism in the era of the Khazar Khaganate. For example, the famous Russian scientist Konstantin Kurdov, in his work “Mountain Jews of Dagestan”, which was published in the Russian Anthropological Journal of 1905, wrote that Mountain Jews are most close to the Lezgins.
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Other researchers note that the representatives of the Simonov tribe, who settled in the Caucasus long ago, are similar to Abkhazians, Ossetians, Avars and Chechens in their customs, traditions and national clothes. The material culture and social organization of all these peoples are almost identical.
Mountain Jews lived for many centuries in large patriarchal families, they had polygamy, and it was necessary to pay bride price for a bride. The customs of hospitality and mutual assistance inherent in neighboring peoples have always been supported by local Jews. Even now they cook dishes of Caucasian cuisine, dance lezginka, perform incendiary music, characteristic of the inhabitants of Dagestan and Azerbaijan.
But, on the other hand, all these traditions do not necessarily indicate ethnic kinship, they could be borrowed in the process of long-term coexistence of peoples. After all, the Mountain Jews have retained their national characteristics, the roots of which go back to the religion of their ancestors. They celebrate all major Jewish holidays, observe wedding and funeral rites, numerous gastronomic prohibitions, and follow the instructions of the rabbis.
The British geneticist Dror Rosengarten analyzed the Y chromosome of Mountain Jews in 2002 and found that the paternal haplotypes of this ethnic group and other Jewish communities largely coincide. Thus, the Semitic origin of the Juuru is now scientifically confirmed.
Fight against Islamization
One of the reasons that allowed the Mountain Jews not to get lost among other inhabitants of the Caucasus is their religion. Firm adherence to the canons of Judaism contributed to the preservation of national identity. It is noteworthy that at the beginning of the 9th century, the class top of the Khazar Khaganate - a powerful and influential empire located in the south of modern Russia - adopted the faith of the Jews. This happened under the influence of representatives of the tribe of Simonov, who lived on the territory of the modern Caucasus. By converting to Judaism, the Khazar rulers received the support of the Jews in the fight against the Arab invaders, whose expansion was stopped. However, the kaganate still fell in the 11th century under the onslaught of the Polovtsians.
Having survived the Mongol-Tatar invasion, for many centuries the Jews fought against Islamization, not wanting to give up their religion, for which they were repeatedly persecuted. Thus, the troops of the Iranian ruler Nadir Shah Afshar (1688-1747), who repeatedly attacked Azerbaijan and Dagestan, did not spare the Gentiles.
Another commander who, among other things, sought to Islamize the entire Caucasus was Imam Shamil (1797-1871), who opposed the Russian Empire, which asserted its influence on these lands in the 19th century. Fearing extermination by radical Muslims, the Mountain Jews supported the Russian army in the fight against Shamil's detachments.
Growers, winemakers, merchants
The Jewish population of Dagestan and Azerbaijan, like their neighbors, is engaged in gardening, winemaking, weaving carpets and fabrics, leatherworking, fishing and other crafts traditional for the Caucasus. There are many successful businessmen, sculptors and writers among the Mountain Jews. For example, one of the authors of the monument to the Unknown Soldier, erected in Moscow near the Kremlin wall, is Yuno Ruvimovich Rabaev (1927-1993). In Soviet times, the writers Khizgil Davidovich Avshalumov (1913-2001) and Mishi Yusupovich Bakhshiev (1910-1972) reflected the life of fellow countrymen in their work. And now books of poems by Eldar Pinkhasovich Gurshumov, who heads the Union of Caucasian Writers of Israel, are being actively published.
Representatives of the Jewish ethnic group on the territory of Azerbaijan and Dagestan should not be confused with the so-called Georgian Jews. This sub-ethnos arose and developed in parallel and has its own original culture.
Orynganym Tanatarova
russian7.ru
Mountain Jews are not a separate people. They represent a group of Jews who, as a result of mass migration, settled in the territory of Azerbaijan and Dagestan. They are characterized by a unique culture, which was formed thanks to their own knowledge and ideas about life, as well as under the influence of other peoples.
Name
Mountain Jews is not an independent name. So called people by their neighbors, who emphasized the foreignness. The people themselves called themselves Juur. The Juur settled in the Caucasus around the 5th century AD.
In recent decades, Mountain Jews have been leaving their native lands. Mostly people move to Israel and the United States of America. Communities in Russia number approximately 30,000. Some Juur live in Europe and Canada.
Language
Many linguists believe that the Juur language can be attributed to the Tat dialect. Mountain Jews call the language Juuri. It should be clarified that tatami are called natives of Persia, who left the region due to civil strife. Like the Mountain Jews, they ended up in the Caucasus. The Tat dialect itself belongs to the Iranian group. Now many Mountain Jews use Hebrew, English, Russian. Some have learned Azerbaijani. At the same time, there are several books and textbooks written in the Hebrew-Tat language.
Nation
There is no definitive answer to the question of which nation the Juurs belong to. A number of scientists who support Konstantin Kurdov put forward a version according to which the Juur comes from the Lezgins. However, there are many dissenters who identify the Mountain Jews as Ossetians, Chechens and Avars. This is due to the established material culture and organization, similar to the peoples listed.
- The Juurs have always had a patriarchy;
- Sometimes there was polygamy, the Jews even supported the peculiarities of the customs of hospitality, characteristic of the neighboring regions;
- Juur prepare Caucasian cuisine, they know Lezginka, in culture they are similar to Dagestanis and Azerbaijanis;
- At the same time, there are differences expressed in the observance of Jewish traditions, including holidays. Among the Mountain Jews there are many who revere the rabbis and live according to their instructions;
- The genetic relationship with the Jews is confirmed by the analyzes of British geneticists who studied the Y chromosomes.
A life
The main occupation of the inhabitants is gardening. Mountain Jews love to make wine, sell carpets, make fabrics and fish. All these are traditional crafts for the inhabitants of the Caucasus. The production of sculptures can be considered unique occupations of the Juur. It was a native of the Mountain Jewish communities who participated in the creation of the monument to the Unknown Soldier. Many among the Mountain Jews turned out to be writers, including Misha Bakhshiev.
Religion
For the Mountain Jews, it was fundamentally important to preserve Judaism. As a result, the influence of their religion was great enough for the Khazar Khaganate to adopt the Jewish faith. In the future, the Khazars, together with the Jews, opposed the Arabs in order to prevent expansion. However, the Polovtsy managed to defeat the armies, and then the Mongol-Tatars came, who forced people to abandon religion. With the advent of the troops of Imam Shamil, the Juur had to make an alliance with the Russian Empire in order to defend the faith.
Food
The cuisine of the Mountain Jews was influenced by neighboring peoples, but people managed to keep many of the recipes. So, many spices predominate in their dishes. Many observe the requirements of kashrut, which prescribe not to eat the meat of a bird of prey and not to mix any kind of meat with milk. Moreover, it is forbidden to eat dairy products (cheese, cottage cheese, cream) mixed with meat dishes. Any vegetables can be used, but they are strictly selected through the representatives of kashrut. The most important culinary tradition is the baking of Sabbath bread. It is baked before Shabbat (Saturday) and is called challah. This bread can be served at the same time as meat. You can eat challah right in the morning, thus opening Shabbat.
The word "challah" means a piece of dough that was separated from the pie to present to the Jerusalem temple. Interestingly, the challah can have a different shape, for example, be performed in the form of a key or a bunch of grapes. The festive challah looks like a circle, which indicates unity with the Almighty. Traditional baking consists of several braided braids.
- During the meeting of Shabbat, a rabbi is invited, two lighted candles are placed on the table, the rabbi breaks off a piece of dough, dips it in salt and passes it on to the challah.
- For breakfast, Mountain Jews always preferred cheese, cream, cottage cheese, to get enough before the start of the working day, but not to put too much stress on the body.
- After work, it was time for the shulkhan, on which a fairly large table was set. Shulkhan necessarily meant the use of snacks, in the role of which were cilantro, parsley and other herbs. Herbs have always been given a special place in the diet, as they made it possible to strengthen the gums and contained many vitamins. Together with greens, they ate vegetables, dried fish. As a hot dish, juur is eaten dyushpere - dumplings with broth and a lot of spices. Onions were necessarily added to it, and the dough was made very thin. Additionally, garlic was added to the dish and flavored with vinegar. Such a recipe is necessary for preparing a hearty and burning dish, because the juur always had to live in the mountains, where the climate is quite severe in winter.
- The container was prepared from beef broth, to which dried cherry plum, onion and a lot of meat are added. Herbs are also added to the dish. A feature of the soup is its excessive density, so it is eaten with the help of cakes, on which the finished mixture is spread.
- From fish heads, tails and fins they make bugleme-jahi. The fish is boiled over low heat, then pre-stewed onions, fish, cherry plums are added to the broth, salt, pepper and boiled rice are added.
- Yagni became a favorite dish of Juur. This dish is also cooked in broth, which is made from chicken or beef. The broth is boiled for 15 minutes, then tomato paste with onions is added.
- The popular dolma is made from ground beef, rice and onions. All ingredients are mixed, then cilantro, parsley, salt, pepper are added. All this is wrapped in grape leaves. It turns out a kind of cabbage rolls. The leaves must be boiled for at least 10 minutes, then, after formation, the cabbage rolls are placed in a saucepan and poured with boiling water. Dolma should be cooked on low heat.
- Another variant of cabbage rolls is called yapragi. This dish, familiar to every inhabitant of Russia and Ukraine, differs only in that more water is added to it.
- From drinks Mountain Jews prefer tea, dry wines.
clothing
The clothing of the Mountain Jews is identical to that worn by the Dagestanis and Kabardians. The Circassian coat is sewn from cloth, the basis for the hat is astrakhan fur or sheep's wool. Many Juurs carry long daggers, which are a must attire. For some time, such weapons were forbidden to carry, but after the end of the 30s of the last century, the ban was lifted. Caftans were used for insulation, which were tied with straps. Such a wardrobe item is typical for Orthodox residents.
Women decorate outfits with metal items and jewelry. A white shirt was put on the body. Pants must be worn on the legs, as religion requires a woman to cover her legs. The head is covered with a scarf, only the father or husband can see the hair. Of the headdresses, a woman is allowed to wear a chudka (chutkha).
Traditions
Mountain Jews, who are often called Caucasian or Persian, in addition to traditional Judaism, are distinguished by their belief in good and evil spirits. Representatives of orthodox communities deny the possibility of the existence of such creatures, but here there is the influence of third-party cultures. It is surprising that such a phenomenon arose in their society, because for him it is completely uncharacteristic. Otherwise, the Juurs follow the Sephardic branch.
Mountain Jews are called Persian, Caucasian. They are still not singled out as a separate people, but they managed to form a unique culture, absorbing the traditions of other peoples and at the same time did not assimilate. This is a unique case for immigrants, which only emphasizes the unusual and diverse life of people in different parts of the world.
From this video you can learn in detail about the life of the Mountain Jews. Features of their history and formation.