Cleveland Jewish News (article from JTA – The Jewish Telegraphic)
By Barry Luxner
September 20, 2022
BAKU, Azerbaijan — It’s a Muslim country that’s friendly toward Jews. It has an ancient culture virtually free of antisemitism that also boasts the world’s only all-Jewish mountain village outside of Israel. And it has a young population of Jews eager to learn about Jewish history and traditions.
Welcome to Azerbaijan, which on Sept. 11 became the first Muslim-majority country ever to host a Limmud FSU conference, a learning event run by the global nonprofit for Jews from formerly Soviet countries.
“I specifically wanted to come here because it’s such an unusual place to host a Limmud,” said Limmud FSU co-founder Sandra Cahn. “Each Limmud has its own flavor, and I’m proud to be able to hold this particular gathering in a Muslim country with so much support from the Jewish community and the government.”
More than 300 people attended Limmud Baku 2022, a daylong festival of learning and Jewish culture in Azerbaijan’s capital that took place in a central hotel overlooking the Caspian Sea.
Baku is home to 4,000 of Azerbaijan’s estimated 24,000 Jews. The rest are so-called Mountain Jews, who have distinct cultural, linguistic and religious traditions that in some ways resemble those of their Muslim neighbors.
“This was our minyan country – the 10th – in which we’ve had a conference,” said Limmud FSU founder Chaim Chesler, “and what a special location. Baku is now part of the Limmud family.”
Noting the presence of 60 children and teenagers at the meetup, the organization’s secretary-general, Diane Wohl, said, “This really reflects the future of Limmud FSU. There’s a whole new energetic group of people here who are yearning to learn.”
Among them is Limmud Baku’s project coordinator, Sara Allahverdiyeva, a 22-year-old with a physics degree and the former program director of the Jewish Agency for Israel office in Baku.
“Jews here have traditions and cuisine you don’t find in other countries,” said Allahverdiyeva. “They spoke Gorski, a language that also died. That’s why people are interested, because if we don’t do conferences like this, people will forget their traditions.”
Natayan Babayeva, 21, was among the conference’s young volunteers.
“I like being part of the Jewish community,” she said. “It is my way of preserving a connection to my roots, because I do not come from a family that observes Jewish traditions. As a child I attended Jewish summer camp, and now I have become a Limmud FSU volunteer.”
For Ilyas Abushzada, 21, this was his first-ever Jewish community event.
“I learned of Limmud through my Jewish friends,” he said. “I want to learn as much as possible about Jewish culture and religion, and I see Limmud as a great opportunity to do that.”
Rabbi Marc Schneier, president of the New York-based Foundation for Ethnic Understanding and a frequent traveler to Muslim-majority countries, said Azerbaijan has the biggest Jewish community of any of the world’s 57 countries where Islam is the dominant religion.
“We Jews are grateful for the role that Azerbaijan and, in particular, President Ilham Aliyev, has played in serving as a role model for the other 56 Muslim countries, especially in three areas: its relationship with Israel, President Aliyev’s reverence and respect for his country’s indigenous Jewish community, and its example of inter-religious tolerance and coexistence,” he said.
Among other things, Azerbaijan’s remote village of Kranaiya Sloboda, located 25 miles south of the Azerbaijani-Russian border, is an all-Jewish shtetl of 3,500 inhabitants that also hosts the Museum of Mountain Jews, which tells the story of this community through artifacts such as traditional costumes and jewelry, ritual utensils, manuscripts and ketubot, or marriage contracts.
Dozens of speakers appeared at the Limmud FSU conference, speaking on topics ranging from the rebirth of Jewish communities in Arab countries to the psychology of motivation and how to achieve happiness. The conference also featured master classes in candle-making, ceramics, collages and painting. And for the first time-ever at a Limmud FSU conference, a volunteer used the occasion as an opportunity to make a public marriage proposal to his girlfriend (she accepted).
Copyright © 2024 Foundation For Ethnic Understanding. All rights reserved. | Privacy Policy