Chala (Jews)
Encyclopedia
Chala is a Tajik
Tajik language
Tajik, Tajik Persian, or Tajiki, is a variety of modern Persian spoken in Central Asia. Historically Tajiks called their language zabani farsī , meaning Persian language in English; the term zabani tajikī, or Tajik language, was introduced in the 20th century by the Soviets...

 term meaning "neither this nor that," referring to Bukharan Jews
Bukharan Jews
Bukharan Jews, also Bukharian Jews or Bukhari Jews, or яҳудиёни Бухоро Yahūdieni Bukhoro , Bukhori Hebrew Script: יהודיאני בוכאראי and יהודיאני בוכארי), also called the Binai Israel, are Jews from Central Asia who speak Bukhori, a dialect of the Tajik-Persian language...

 who were allegedly forcibly converted to Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and .   : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

 beginning in the late eighteenth century. In response, these Chala Jews outwardly practiced Islam, but secretly retained their Jewish traditions. These crypto-Jews married among themselves and lived in their own neighborhoods that bordered on existing Jewish neighborhoods. The Chala Jews carry a very similar story to the Marranos of Spain.

Chala Jews were unable to return to their true Jewish faith due to the fatal consequences associated with leaving the Islamic faith. The Islamic rulership during this period imposed a death penalty against those renouncing their Islamic faith. Therefore, it was not until the emergence of Imperial Russian, and Soviet rule that Chala Jews were able to revert to their original faith. Ironically, these crypto-Jews lived in nearby neighborhoods that sat next to existing Jewish neighborhoods, where there were openly practicing Jews living at the same time as the Chala.

By the 19th century, there were Chala communities that emerged in the cities of: Samarkand
Samarkand
Although a Persian-speaking region, it was not united politically with Iran most of the times between the disintegration of the Seleucid Empire and the Arab conquest . In the 6th century it was within the domain of the Turkic kingdom of the Göktürks.At the start of the 8th century Samarkand came...

, Khiva
Khiva
Khiva is a city of approximately 50,000 people located in Xorazm Province, Uzbekistan. It is the former capital of Khwarezmia and the Khanate of Khiva...

, Kokand
Kokand
Kokand is a city in Fergana Province in eastern Uzbekistan, at the southwestern edge of the Fergana Valley. It has a population of 192,500 . Kokand is 228 km southeast of Tashkent, 115 km west of Andijan, and 88 km west of Fergana...

, Margilan
Margilan
Margilan is a city in Fergana Province in eastern Uzbekistan. It is located at latitude 40°28' 16 N: longitude 71°43' 29 E. at an altitude of 487 meters....

, and Shahrisabz
Shahrisabz
Shakhrisabz , is a city in Uzbekistan located approximately 80 km south of Samarkand with the population of 53,000 . It is located at the altitude of 622 m. Once a major city of Central Asia, it is primarily known today as the birthplace of 14th century Turco-Mongol conqueror Timur...

. Often, it was not until two to three generations that Chala Jews would begin to intermarry with the local Muslim population and shed any remaining Jewish traditions.

The return of the Chala to Judaism began with the Russian conquest of Central Asia in 1867. While the Khiva
Khanate of Khiva
The Khanate of Khiva was the name of a Uzbek state that existed in the historical region of Khwarezm from 1511 to 1920, except for a period of Persian occupation by Nadir Shah between 1740–1746. It was the patrilineal descendants of Shayban , the fifth son of Jochi and grandson of Genghis Khan...

 and Kokand
Khanate of Kokand
The Khanate of Kokand was a state in Central Asia that existed from 1709–1883 within the territory of modern eastern Uzbekistan, southern Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan...

 khanates were incorporated into the Turkestan governorate
Russian Turkestan
Russian Turkestan was the western part of Turkestan within the Russian Empire , comprising the oasis region to the south of the Kazakh steppes, but not the protectorates of the Emirate of Bukhara and the Khanate of Khiva.-History:-Establishment:Although Russia had been pushing south into the...

, the Bukhara Khanate remained autonomous and continued to enforce the death penalty against those who abandoned Islam
Apostasy in Islam
Apostasy in Islam is commonly defined in Islam as the rejection in word or deed of one's former religion by a person who was previously a follower of Islam...

. As a result, many Chala Jews illegally immigrated into Russian controlled areas, to escape the certain threat of death. Although Russian law required that these newcomers to be deported back to Bukhara and face an imminent death, the deportation orders were continuously delayed, and thus many had remained as permanent non-citizens of the Russian Turkestan region. Some Chala Jews also joined merchant guilds in order to prove their economic use to the empire. Because Muslim law was retained in Bukhara for a longer period than in surrounding cities, by the time communist Soviet rule arrived in Bukhara, many members of the local Chala no longer identified themselves as Jewish, and were fully assimilated into the Muslim population.

Following the installation of Soviet rule
Bukharan People's Soviet Republic
The Bukharan People's Soviet Republic was a short-lived Soviet state which governed the former Emirate of Bukhara during the period immediately following the Russian Revolution from 1920-1925. In 1924 its name was changed to the Bukharan Soviet Socialist Republic...

 in 1920, , the religious distinction among the population was no longer officially recognized. Nevertheless, ethnic distinctions on passports enabled many Chala Jews to continue being counted as ethnic Uzbeks
Uzbeks
The Uzbeks are a Turkic ethnic group in Central Asia. They comprise the majority population of Uzbekistan, and large populations can also be found in Afghanistan, Tajikstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Pakistan, Mongolia and the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China...

 and Tajiks, rather than Jews.

In 2000, author Mansur Surosh published a novel Chala ("The Outcasts"), which describes the experiences of the chala.

See also

  • Emirate of Bukhara
    Emirate of Bukhara
    The Emirate of Bukhara was a Central Asian state that existed from 1785 to 1920. It occupied the land between the Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers, known formerly as Transoxiana. Its core territory was the land along the lower Zarafshan River, and its urban centres were the ancient cities of...

  • Judaism and Islam
  • Allahdad incident
    Allahdad incident
    In the 1839 Allahdad incident, the Jews of Mashhad, Iran, now known as the Mashhadi Jews, were coerced into converting to Islam.Mashhad's ruler had ordered his men to enter Jewish homes and mobs attacked the Jewish Community, burning down the synagogue, looting homes, abducting girls, and killing...

  • Marrano
    Marrano
    Marranos were Jews living in the Iberian peninsula who converted to Christianity rather than be expelled but continued to observe rabbinic Judaism in secret...

  • Neofiti
    Neofiti
    The neofiti were a group of Italian anusim, also known as crypto-Jews, living in Southern Italy.-History:The Jewish ancestors of the neofiti were forced to convert to Roman Catholicism in 1493. They continued to secretly practice certain elements of Judaism, however, as did many of their descendants...

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