On Sun, 26 Sep 2004, John Bizwas wrote:
> Judaism might well have held as much attraction as Christianity or
> Islam. Perhaps the role of Judaism as a 'missionary' religion seeking
> converts in its history needs re-examined. Also tipping the
> balance--perhaps--in favor of Judaism would have been an influx of Jews,
> including religious leaders, into the Khazar state.
John, forgive me if you've said this and I've missed this; I haven't yet had time to give your long posts the detailed examination they deserve. But so far I don't think I've seen you address the simplest, most conventional, and to my mind perfectly plausible explanation for the conversion of the Khazars to Judaism. They controlled the Caucasus and below, which was the geographical equivalent of a swing state. It was the path of invasion either of the Byzantines into various Muslim lands, or of the Muslims into Byzantium. If the Khazars allied with either side, they would have made themselves the frontline state in an eternal war with bigger neighbors. They wanted a situation where threats from either direction could be met by aid from the other. If they remained pagan, neither side would respect them. If they converted to Christianity or Islam, they would have chosen sides. So as I understand it, conversion to Judaism was esssentially an inspired strategic choice. Judaism was chosen because it was the third monotheism, which made regarded as a civilized rather than a barbarian kingdom. But it didn't take sides.
I find this explanation perfectly plausible. Conversion for political and strategic reasons like this is extremely common in history, both among individuals and rulers. And the idea that the religion of the ruler was the religion of his state (by definition, no matter what the state of things on the ground) was the norm until modern times (actually even into modern times) making the question of how far it went kind of irrelevant for explaining why it happened in the first place. Is there a reason you're discarding this line of argument and focussing exclusively on more complicated and controversial lines?
Michael