It’s that time of year again: Passover, the Jewish holiday commemorating the Exodus, is upon us. Many Passover customs are more or less consistent around the world—avoiding leavened bread, serving matzah and other symbolic meals, recounting essential portions of the Passover narrative—but as these images illustrate, they can vary dramatically in appearance and feel depending…
For the past 2,000 years, the Bene Israel community has lived in India, but unlike the Parsis, the country’s Jews are difficult to recognize. This is partly because Parsi cuisine, customs, and lovable individuals have become part of Mumbai’s allure. The Bene Israelis (Hebrew for “children of Israel”), on the other hand, have assimilated Indian…
The Jewish community in Mumbai clings to centuries of tradition, but their numbers are rapidly shrinking. India’s Mumbai – Although it was once a sizable community, India’s Jewish population has shrunk dramatically, leaving only a small minority who are fighting to preserve their traditions alive. More than 2,000 years ago, the first Jews arrived in…
My research on the movement of Jews from India to Israel since 1948 and their socio-cultural absorption into Israeli society brought me to several interesting works by sociologists, anthropologists, and historians last week when I was reading about Indian Jewry. As a defense studies student, I am well aware of India’s and Israel’s strong military…
India has been home to Jewish groups who have been persecuted for a long time. One of them is the Bene Israel, which has been around for more than 2,000 years now. Of course, India has always been open to a wide range of religions. This place is the birthplace or home of at least…
Siona Benjamin, a Jewish-Indian artist, uses the imagery of blue-skinned individuals in her paintings. It’s both a metaphor and a reflection of her upbringing. She writes, “I regularly look down at my skin and it has turned blue.” “It tends to do that when I encounter folks classifying and labeling people who are different from…
Siona Benjamin’s art contains an intriguing array of cultural symbols. Take, for example, Finding Home No. 46, “Tikkun ha-Olam” (2000). The blue-hued, many-armed central figure is stylized to look like a Hindu goddess, yet her arms are in the shape of a seven-branched Menorah. Aside from the goddess-like figure, there is delicate Hebrew writing painted…
Apart from the time-honored rituals of children and adventurous adults screaming and stomping their feet to scare away the evil Haman during readings from the ‘Megillah,’ the congregation will witness a slice of Marathi Jewish history at sundown this Thursday if synagogues in the city are allowed their two-day Purim celebrations — a festival commemorating…
The West Indian Bene Israel Jewish community is a special people whose existence before the 18th century is largely unknown. Members of Bene Israel consider themselves to be Jewish descendants, but the identity of Jewish ancestors and their arrival time in India is uncertain, with estimates ranging from the 8th century BCE to the 6th…
Malayalam Zionist songs, which incorporate melodies and rhetoric from Indian cinema and political music from the twentieth century, are a noteworthy example of Jewish integration and contribution to Kerala’s diverse culture. Kerala Jews composed songs in Malayalam right up until they departed for the newly formed nation of Israel, and ten modern Zionist songs were…