Pesakh (general)

Pesakh (Hebrew: פסח‎ PSḤ) was a Khazar Jewish general mentioned in the Schechter Letter. Pesakh was military commander of the region around the Strait of Kerch who defeated the armies of the Rus' prince HLGW (Hebrew: הלגו‎), most likely Oleg of Novgorod, around the year 941 in the Taman region.

The letter associates Pesakh with the term BWLŠṢY (Hebrew: בולשצי‎), literally stating בולשצי הוא פסח‎, or, "BWLŠṢY (is) he, Pesakh". This has given rise to two interpretations: that BWLŠṢY represents the Khazar military title baliqchi, which is only attested to by the Greek accounts of Theophanes the Confessor - thus affording the reading "Pesakh, he (who is the) baliqchi" - or, that BWLŠṢY represents the Turkic personal name Boluščï, indicating that "Pesakh" was merely the general's nickname, or at the very least was not his name at birth - thus affording the reading "Boluščï, he (who is called) Pesakh". Assuming BWLŠṢY does represent the title of baliqchi, it might indicate that Pesakh commanded a fleet of ships, instead of soldiers on the ground, as baliqchi is thought to roughly translate to "Fisherman" (or, in alternate translation "Fish-Lord") in the Khazar language; leading scholars to hypothesize that the office was actually a naval rank within the Khazar military.

Sources
  • Kevin Alan Brook. The Jews of Khazaria. 2nd ed. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc, 2006.
  • Dunlop, Douglas M. The History of the Jewish Khazars, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1954.
  • Golb, Norman and Omeljan Pritsak. Khazarian Hebrew Documents of the Tenth Century. Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press, 1982.
  • Zuckerman, Constantine. "On the Date of the Khazar’s Conversion to Judaism and the Chronology of the Kings of the Rus Oleg and Igor." Revue des Etudes Byzantines 53 (1995): 237–270.
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