Sephardim in India      They came from Spain and Portugal via Italy, Turkey, and Syria. Like many other refugee groups seeking religious freedom, the Sephardim became part and parcel of India. Following in the footsteps of the Cochine Jews 1500 years earlier, the Nestorian Christians and Zoroastrians from Persia, Ashkenazim in the 1930s, and most recently Buddhists from Tibet, Sephardic Jews found refuge, freedom, dignity and prosperity on India’s hospitable shores.      They included some remarkable personalities, pioneers all: a Portuguese botanist who once owned Bombay, spice merchants and diplomats in Cochin on the Malabar Coast, opium traders turned industrial entrepreneurs in Bombay, real estate tycoons in Calcutta, and movie mughals in Bollywood.      Here tales of the “Jewish Raj,” the story of the Sephardim in India.

OTHER LECTURES:

A Year with the Jews of Cochin	Identity Transformed: The Bene Israel of India	Baghdadi Jews of Indian Port Cities
Two Models of Jewish Continuity in India	Jews in the Mughal Empire	The Chinese Jews of K'ai-feng
Fall & Rise of India-Israeli Relations	The Dalai Lama's 'Jewish Secret'	Buddhism and American Judaism
What is Hindu-Jewish Dialogue All About?	Jews and Judaism in the Quran	From JuBu to OJ
The Importance of Jewish Meditation	Jews and Gurus

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