Heart and Soul: The caretaker of Bukhara

The Documentary Podcast

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.3 • 2.6K Ratings

🗓️ 14 February 2025

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Abram Iskhakov is the caretaker of the oldest synagogue in Bukhara, one of the sacred cities of Islam. He is keeper of a Torah inscribed on deer velum and kept safe for 1000 years, or so the story goes. Abram has a powerful voice and recites for us a very special prayer, the Haqqoni, recited at both Jewish and Muslim mourning services in Persian, the language of his city and of Central Asian Jews from Samarkand to the borders of China. What does Haqqoni tell us about the culture of Central Asia? And as the Bukharan Jewish population migrates across the world, what is becoming of the Haqqoni?

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the documentary from the BBC World Service.
0:03.6	I'm Monica Whitlock, and for heart and soul we've come to Bukhara in Uzbekistan
0:08.4	to listen to a very special piece of music. I'm the head of Pukharia. I'm the head of Pukharian Jewish community.
0:28.6	Abraham Ishakov.
0:30.6	Abraham Borisovich.
0:32.6	Our mosque, our synagogue, is 420 years old. It's the oldest one in Central Asia, our mosque, our Synagogue, is 420 years old.
0:41.2	It's the oldest one in Central Asia, our mosque, our synagogue.
0:49.8	Yet the voice of the Torah has never ceased to resound here.
0:54.5	And as long as I live, the Torah will always be heard.
1:04.1	Abraham Isakoff is the caretaker of the Mullahmani Synagogue in Bukhara,
1:08.1	one of the sacred cities of the Muslim world in Uzbekistan.
1:14.1	Mullahmani is a tiny place arranged around a courtyard opening off Serafan Street,
1:20.4	an alley in the heart of a medieval city famous for its ancient and beautiful mosques and madrasas.
1:34.6	We have the Torah here. Our Torah is more than 1,000 years old, ancient. One rarely sees such an old Torah in Central Asia, or indeed in the world.
1:45.2	This is the oldest scroll. It's kept in a cupboard, glass-fronted cupboard with a padlock at the back of the synagogue.
1:50.2	And what we can see is two velvet sides of the scroll.
1:53.3	And inside, it's very delicate.
1:55.9	It's made of deerskin vellum.
2:02.9	And Abram says they take it out just for very special occasions.
2:16.2	We come here every Shabbat, all holidays such as Passover, Sukkot, Shavut, and Yom Kippur.
2:22.7	We learned everything as it was, just as our fathers' fathers taught us. I'm Monica Whitlock, and this heart and soul from the BBC World Service
2:40.1	is all about a prayer that Abraham sang to me that day in Bukhara.
	...

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