Iranian Jews

There has been a Jewish presence in Iran for thousands of years. Iranian Jewish culture is one of the oldest in the world. The revolution resulted in most Iranian Jews moving to Israel, America, and Canada. So today, most Iranian Jews live outside of Iran. 

However, a lot of people in Iran and our of Iran have Jewish ancestry that is hidden. Because of the nature of Iranian society, past and present, the best way to track down your hidden Jewish ancestry, would be to learn about Iranian Jewish history, and see if any of it fits with your family story. 

As ever, wikipedia is a great place to start. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Jews

If you have a list of last names you have collected from your family tree, and you suspect they are Jewish last names, or were once Jewish surnames, the place to look is www.jewishgen.com Once you are in that site, you can enter a last name into the general search, search bar, and all the records for people with that last name will come up. 

The results will tend to be sorted by country. Using my family as an example, if you enter Winkler into the general search bar, the result was records for Winklers living in Germany, Poland, Ukraine, Hungary, etc. Birth records, death records, marriage records, and sadly holocaust records. As I knew my Winklers lived in Germany, I clicked on the German file, and up came a list of Winklers that lived in Germany. I was able to find some Winklers on my family tree that were listed in records for Jews named Winkler who lived in Germany. 

Looking at the results from a general search will immediately give you an idea where Jewish people with that last name lived. If you know your family came from Poland, the general search has a listing for say, Winklers in Poland, that file or files would be a good place to have a look. You may find an ancestor. Or you may find that there were quite a few Winklers in Poland, and you Winkler may very well have been a Jew named Winkler who lived in Poland. The general search is a great place to do fast name checking. Whatever you find, will begin to fill in some gaps in your story. 

www.jewishgen.com 

Iran is and has been an Islamic country for a long time. As Jews have always been a persecuted minority, conversion to Islam has occurred over the centuries. Sometimes people were forced to convert, sometimes people chose to convert. But, chances are greater than not, if they did convert, it became a family secret. 

There is one book that really talks about conversion in Iran, the book that follows discusses the phenomena in detail, in the modern context. It's a must read if you are Iranian and suspect you have Jewish ancestry. 

There are many other great books on Iranian Jewish life. If you suspect you have Iranian Jewish descent, for whatever reason, a good place to start is with a book on Iranian Jewish life. As you read about the lives of Jews in Iran, you may recognize your families history within the greater Iranian Jewish history. You may come across a clue that allows you to ask family members the right question. I really like this book as a starter book. 

The Jews of Iran: The History, Religion and Culture of a Community in the Islamic World (International Library of Iranian Studies)

You can find it below.