Conference taveng::bagels

    	Plenty of rabbis are Sephardic Jews, including the chief Sephardic
    rabbi in Israel... The main technical difference between Sephardim and
    Ashkenazim is/are the melodies and order of some prayers. Also, some
    local Jewish dialects are used only by Sephardim, others only by
    Ashkenazim - mostly reflecting the local languages wherever Jews in
    Diaspora used to live.
    
    	Ashkenazis are "european" Jews, roughly those who went north (to
    France, later Germany and Eastern Europe) after
    being expelled from Spain during the Inquisition. Khazars used to be a
    Turkic/Mongol nation, at one time they had their own state in the upper
    Volga steppes. A portion of Khazar elite practiced Judaism, other
    portions were Moslems and even some Christians (I think). There are a
    couple of recent obscure books on the subject. Khazar Empire was
    defeated in the Middle Ages, and Khazars assimilated into the
    conquering neighbors with no trace, except for historical records and
    Russian folklore. 
    	An interesting piece of Arab propaganda is that the
    "european" Jews aren't true Jews, but are rather Khazar descendants,
    and thus have not historical claim in Palestine. This is pure bunk, as
    there are copious records of family trees and so on from the Middle
    Ages onto today - the Jews are the People of the Book, after all. For
    what it's worth, Japanese too have kept such records through the ages,
    and so have some other nations.
    	I'd say someone has been feeding you grievously incorrect info, I
    wonder what for?
    
    DG

      So the Sephardic Jews have always been in the Holy Land?  Is there
    any in fighting between the Sephardic Jews and the Ashkenazi Jews?
    I am not asking to cause any trouble but I am just trying to learn
    more about Jews.  
    
      Is orthodoxy stronger among Sephardic Jews?  
    
    
                                Marshall

    	The Sephardic Jews mostly live/lived in the Mediterranean basin
    countries, as well as Iran and some other parts of the region. Both
    Sephardic and Ashkenazi Jews have always lived in what's now called
    Palestine, sometimes in smaller numbers than other times. Ashkenazi
    Jews in today's Israel are mostly migrants and their descendants from
    Europe - the Holocaust remnants if you will, also from North America
    and other parts of the world. The Sephardim are mostly from Morocco,
    Yemen, Iran, Southern USSR, other countries of the North Africa and
    Middle East as well. Many of them speak Arabic as a second/first
    language.
    	Today's Israel was founded mainly by Ashkenazi waves of pioneers,
    then absorbed the Holocaust survivors (mostly European Jews), then
    quickly absorbed a huge wave of Sephardic Jews fleeing the Arab
    countries and their post-Israel-independence extreme oppression of
    their Jews. There is considerable tension between the two branches of
    Israeli society, with Sephardim slowly rising up to the Ashkenazi
    average standard of living, education, and political power. One huge
    reason why Sephardim have less, is because the Arab countries robbed
    them blind as they were leaving, with no compensation to date. Other
    reasons have to do with absorbing into a "European" society, having
    modern skills, class/outsider prejudice. I am sure other, more
    knowledgeable contributors can answer your questions more fully, mine
    is but a sketchy picture.
    
    
    DG

>	Both Sephardic and Ashkenazi Jews have always lived in 
>	what's now called Palestine...

Freudian slip?  It's now called *Israel* (and parts are called Jordan),
at least by our friends.

Otherwise, it's not a bad sketch in a few lines.  In my opinion though, the
"considerable tension" you refer to is becoming less every year (albeit
with periodic flare-ups), due among other things to the visible presence of
Sephardim in all areas of leadership (at some point in the last decade, the
President (Navon), Minister of Interior (Peretz, Deri), and the IDF Chief
of the General Staff (Levy) have all been Sephardim), and to the increase
in so-called "intermarriage" between Ashkenazim and Sephardim. 

Sid 

The "Ashkenaz" is the Jewish name for a section of Europe which -
as I understand it - centers around Germany and Poland. Jewish
communities in this area predate the expulsion from Spain in 1492.
I have been reading of the mistreatment of Ashkenazic communities
by rabble mobs during the Crusades in the 12th and 13th centuries.

During most of the Middle Ages Spain was the center of Jewish culture.

The first Jewish immigrants to America were Sephardic and there was
some sort of friction when the Ashkenazic immigrees began to arrive.
In this instance, the Sephardis were the "haves" and the Ashkenazis
the "have nots". These conflicts have a way of working themselves
out eventually.

Dave

To put this in a context you might better understand, you might consider
whether there are differences between Irish Catholics and Italian Catholics.
To an outsider, both are Catholic/Christian; but someone who is part of
the community would be able to pick out many differences.  For that matter,
the Hopi and Navaho tribes look "the same" to my European eyes, but the
distinctions are great and numerous.

Again, to summarize, Ashkenazic (the word means "German") Jews are
generally from Northern/Central/Eastern Europe (including Poland
and the Ukraine).  Their at-home language is Yiddish, which split
from German around the 11th century and gained a large number of
loan words from Hebrew and the surrounding communities.  Most American
Jews are from Ashkenazic roots.

Sephardic (the word means "Spain") Jews are generally from south
of the Alps: the Mediterranian, Spain, Provence, Italy, Yugoslavia,
Greece Roumania, Bulgaria, as well as North Africa and the Middle East.

Although there are cultural differences, I suspect they are less than
those within the Christian community.

You might find reading Mitchner's "The Source" offers a good fictional
introduction to Judiasim, by the way.

Martin.

    	 re.4 Actually, I used Palestine precisely because it's not the
    same area as today's Israel, but rather larger. Thanks for the help
    in answering the questions. My wife correctly pointed out that one
    of the main reasons why the mass of Sephardic refugees circa 1949-1951
    was poorer than their hosts - a large percentage of wealthy Moroccan
    and Iranian and Iraqi and other Jewish communities left for France, US,
    Canada and so on, leaving the poorer strata to go on to Israel.
    
    DG

about the Khazars:

is the account in the Kuzari by R. Yehuda Halevi about how the Khazars converted
to Judaism considered historically acurate?

I once heard (probably incorrectly) that the whole story about the Khazars was
a myth, and was used by R. Yehuda Halevi as the vehicle to present his views.

please enlighten

			Louuuuuuuuuuu

Graetz discusses the Khazars as fact. I believe the kingdom of the Khazars
was crushed just before the generation of Judah HaLevi. The Spanish
community learned of the existance of this kingdom and got excited about
it just prior to its demise. The Khazars continued with their Judaism up
until the time the power of the Church reached them.

Dave

    The Khazars were real, but probably didn't constitute a large
    polulation, being nomadic herders.  The major conflict in that
    place and time was between Islam and Orthodox Christianty;
    becoming Jewish was a way of not committing completely to one
    side or the other.  I don't know why they didn't keep their
    original religion--the Magyars and Mongols of the same time
    and area did, after all.
    
    As long as you're wondering about the Khazar contribution to
    the Ashkenazim, you might also wonder about the Arab contribution
    to the Sephardim: many Arab tribes converted to Judaism in the
    Roman Imperial era (I remember a Scientific American article
    about these conversions from some years ago ).
    
    I suspect that the Diaspora, while important, is not the major
    source of genes in the current population of Jews, and that
    conversions are more important--but so what?  It's only if you
    think that Jewishness is primarily a matter of blood rather than
    culture or one's ethnic or religious identification, that this
    is an issue, as I'll grant it would be for anyone who claimed 
    to be a true Levite or Cohen, or of the line of David.
    
    			-John Bishop

    ... another objective seeker of historic truth has just posted an
    article in SX4GTO::ANTIQUITY with the following title:
    
>Note 165.0                JEWS NOT BIBLICAL ISRAELITES               
>          HISTORY REVEALS MODERN "JEWS" ARE NOT BIBLICAL ISRAELITES
    
    citing, e.g., "The Thirteenth Tribe" by Arthur Koestler as evidence.
    I do not think there any need to re-post the article here, the title 
    says it all (note the syntax and the semantics).
    
    Alex

    The replies to the note are divided between those who think the base
    premise is flaming drivel and those who think it is out-of-this-world
    flaming drivel.
    
    						Ann B.

    Leaving out the flames and drivel, what *is* the base premise, or is
    there basically nothing left if the flames and drivel are left out?
    
    I find ancient history infinitely fascinating, especially trying to
    determine what has happened in modern times to the descendents of the
    historical tribal groups and how the history has shaped the modern
    aspirations of those peoples.  For example, who are the descendents of
    the ancient Egyptians?  How about the modern-day Muslims in
    (rapdily-fragmenting) Yugoslavia and the rest of the Balkans - who were
    their ancestors who were forcibly converted to Islam?
    
    /Charlotte

    Oh, here, just press KP7 or Select, and read Note 165.  ANTIQUITY
    is a good, scholarly conference; you'll enjoy it.
    
    							Ann B.
    
    Translation:  My eyes glazed over reading the basenote; I can't
    fairly summarize it.