Interior of Vizir Khan at Aleppo.
KIIATCHADUR
70
KHLESL
private character). The earlier Hebrews knew of no I such provision for travellers (Gen. xlii, 27 ; Exod. iv, 24; 2 Kings xix, 23; the "jlb^ being merely the stop- ping-place over night; the tlJTT of Josh, ii, 1 indicating rather a brothel, and the TT'D of 1 Sam. xix, 18 the home of the prophet-scholars). Entertainment was generally furnished by individual hospitality (q. v.). — Winer, i, 479.
Khatchadiir, an Armenian theologian, flourished in tlie opening of the 17th century. He was bishop of Dehiiugha, and in 1G30 was sent by the Armenian patri- arch Michael HI to Constantinople on an ecclesiastical mission, and later to Poland. He is particularly cele- brated, however, as a poet.— Hoefer, iVc<(»-. £'io^. 6'e«er. xxvii, 075.
Khatchid I, elected patriarch of Armenia in 972, is noted in tlie annals of the ecclesiastical history of Arme- nia for the interest he manifested toward literature and the fine arts, and for the establishment of a number of monasteries. He died at his residence in Arkina in 992. — Hoefer, Xouv. Biog. Gemrale, xxvii, G7G.
Khatchid II was patriarch of Armenia in 1058, but was oppressed by the Byzantine emperor Constantine Ducas, who imprisoned him for some three years, and then banished him to Cappadocia. He died in 1064. — Hoefer, Xoia: Biog. Generak, xxvii, 670.
Khazars or Khozars is the name of a Finnish people, a rude Ijut powerful nation, north of the Cauca- sus, related to the Bulgarians and Hungarians, which in the 8th century embraced Judaism. After the disso- lution of the empire of the Huns they settled on the borders of Europe and Asia, and at one time possessed a realm near the mouth of the Wolga (by thera called Itil or Atel), on the Caspian Sea (after them sometimes called Khazar Sea), where the Kalmucks (q. v.) now live. They gave much uneasiness to the Persians, es- pecially during the reign of Khosru I (q. v.), and in the 7th century, after the downfall of the Sassanians, the Khazars went across the Caucasus, invaded Armenia, and conquered the Crimea, hence called at one time Khnzuri or Cho(a)zar{. The Byzantine emperors trem- bled before the warlike skill of the Khazars, and paid large tributes to keep them at a respectful distance from Constantinople ; the Bulgarians and other peoples ■were their vassals ; the Russians (Kievians) appeased their desire for conquest by an annual tribute, and with the Arabs they -were waging constant warfare. But by degrees, as they abandoned their nomadic hab- its, their warUke spirit decreased, and they largely fostered commercial intercourse with the outer world. They exchanged dried fish, the furs of the north, and slaves for the gold and silver and the luxuries of south- ern climates. JMerchants of all religions — Jews, Chris- tians, and jMohammedans — were freely admitted, and their superior intelligence over his more barbarous sub- jects Liduced one of their kings, Bulan, to forsake their coarse, idolatrous worship, greatly mixed with sensu- ousness and licentiousness, and to embrace (A.D. 740) the Jewish religion. "By one account," says Milman (Jews, iii, 138), "he was admonished by an angel; bj' another, he decided in this singular manner between the claims of Christianity, IMoslemism. and Judaism. He examined the diflerent teachers apart, and asked the Christians if Judaism were not better than IMoham- medanism ; the Moliammedan, whether it was not bet- ter than Christianity, lioth replied in tlie afiirmative; on which the monarch decided in favor of Judaism." According to one statement secretly, to another openly, lie embraced the faith of IMoses, and induced learned teachers of the law to settle in his dominions. Of Course, at first, the change of religious belief was confined to the royal household, and the four thousand nobles of the land, who. with Bulan, embraced Judaism ; but soon the new religion spread, and ere long tlie majority of the nation bowed in adoration to the one and ever-livintr
God. Judaism actually became a necessary condition to the succession to the throne, but there was the most Uberal toleration to all other forms of faith. See Oba- DiAii. liabbi Hasdai, a learned Jew, who was in the highest confidence with Abderrahman, the caliph of Cordova, first receiveil intelligence of this sovereignty possessed by his brethren through the ambassadors of the Byzantine emperor. After considerable difficulty, Hasdai succeeded in establishing a correspondence with Joseph, the reigning king. The letter of Hasdai is ex- tant, and an answer of the king, which does not possess equal claims to authenticity. The Avhole history has been wrought out into a religious romance, entitled Cosri [see Jehuda ha-Levi], which has involved the question in great obscurity. Basnage rejected the whole as a fiction of the Kabbins, anxious to prove that " the sceptre had not entirely departed from Israel." Jost inclines to the belief that " there is a groundwork of truth under the veil of poetic embellishment." The latest writers upon the subject admit without hesita- tion, and Jewish writers almost boast of the kingdom of Khazar. Comp. Friihn's Commentary of Ibn-Foszlan "Z>e ChazuTis" (in the Memoires de V Academic Tmperi- ale des Sciences de Peteishoitr-g, 1822, vol. viii) ; D'Hos- son, Peuples dti Cciucase; Dufremery, in the Journal A siatique, 1849, p. 470 sq. ; Eeinaud, A hulfeda, Introd. p. 299; "\'ivien de St. Martin, Les Khazars (in the Mhn. a VAcademie des Inscriptions et des BeUes-Lettres, Paris, 1851). The Khazars became extinct as a nation in A. D. 945, when they were conquered by Swaitoslaw [duke of Kiev (q. v.)], and their name, otherwise almost for- gotten, was preserved in the archives of the jMuscovite. See Schweitzer, JtidrUssiclie ViJlker ; Carmoly, Itine- raires de la Terre Sainte (Brux. 1847), ]x 1-104; Ilapo- port, Kerem Chemed, v, 197 sq. ; Cassel, in Ersch und GrulDcr, Encyklopadie ; Griitz, Geschichfe d. Juden, v, 211 sq. ; Rule, Karaites, p. 79 sq. See Kief. (J. H. W.)