© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, | doi:./- bja
Journal of Religion in Europe () –
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Georgian Israelites or Jews of Georgia
Religious and National Dimensions of the Georgian-Jewish Identity
Ketevan Kakitelashvili
Institute of Cultural Studies, Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University,
Tbilisi, Georgia
ketevan.kakitelashvili@tsu.ge
Abstract
The paper explores the evolution of Georgian-Jewish identity in different political,
ideological, and cultural contexts from the late nineteenth to the early twenty-first
centuries. It is focused on the beginning of the twentieth century when religious and
national dimensions of Georgian-Jewish identity were developed as competing iden-
tity models. This paper addresses the impact of these identity models on contemporary
Georgian-Jewish identity.
Keywords
Georgian Jews – identity – assimilationists – Zionism – Agudath Israel