Khazar

i've just read a book called The Thirteenth Tribe by Alfred Koestler. it was about the khazars and it stated 3 main themes:
1) they were the only nonsemitic people, or nation, or whatever, to adopt judaism as their religion
2) they were a great power in the area between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea between around 650 to about 1230. they fought the byzantines, the arab caliphate, the viking, or better said the rhus, they subdued the maghyar and the bulgar tribes and they got tribute form some slav tribes.
3) there were semicilized, living in tents but having big ities, lacking culture but having a lot of educated jews that wrote corepondence and kept the books

two issues were also raised:
1) when the maghyars left the area (about 900 - 950) they were lead by a group of khazars that did most of the figting for the maghyars as they settled in pannona. the khazars fought and the farming oriented maghyars settled
2) a majority of the jews in the world today are in fact nonsemitic, but descendants of the khazars

what do you think? what info on the khazars do you have? what seems right and what wring what other books on the subject are out there?
I know history should be taken with a pinch of salt. that's why i'm asking you guys for info...

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1-1: Wrong. Falasha are Ethiopian Jews; Ethiopians are not a semitic people. The fact that their imperial dynasty trace their legendary roots to Solomon is irrelevant.

2-2: Not a new issue. I'm not an expert on anthropolgy, genetics or anything around that but it just sounds irrational to me. It may be firmly argued that the Ashkenazi are not of semitic descent but rather converted slavics and germanics etc. under Khazar dominion. However, the Khazar core were a Turk people and, typically as in almost every state lead by Turks, were only the "core" but the minority population-wise.

The Karaite Jews are more reasonably said to have descended from the Khazars. But still I tend to think that they are descendants of the Khazar Empire, not the Turk core.

Thanks for the post. :bow:
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