These Bhukharan women have gathered together to perform a special ceremony for the newborn baby boy you see in the middle of the picture. This is how the photographer, Zion Ozeri, describes it: Its a customand I didnt fiŒnd it in any other community around the world, just there. It is right before a circumcision. You see the babys feet protrude here, and this one with the kettle, shes actually pouring water on this matriarch whos seated. The water fiŒrst washes the babys feet and then her hands, and she makes a bracha [blessing]. And then they take the baby to be circumcised. What I like about it is that its women actually participating in this traditionthat theyre not just spectators, but theyre also participants.
Although Jewish boys everywhere are circumcised when theyre eight days old, this hand- and footwashing custom is unique to the Jewish community of Bukhara, Uzbekistan. Jews have lived in Central Asia for centuries and have developed many distinctive traditions. Although some Jews still live in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, many have moved to Israel or to Queens, New York, where there are now large communities of Central Asian Jews.