As a close friend waited for his flight at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport, he noticed several Bene Israel families among the travelers and immediately texted me. Years earlier, I had told him about my Jewish neighbors while growing up in Maharashtra, India. The Bene Israel are descendants of Jews who sought refuge in India as early as the second century BCE. Over many centuries they adopted Marathi, my mother tongue, while faithfully preserving Jewish traditions such as the Sabbath, circumcision, and kosher practices. They flourished without persecution, and their synagogues continue to stand as respected places of worship.

For many Jews outside India, the Bene Israel remain little known. Yet their history offers one of the world’s most remarkable examples of religious coexistence. For nearly two millennia, Jews lived among a Hindu majority without experiencing the state-sponsored antisemitism, expulsions, or pogroms that scarred so much of Jewish history elsewhere. India did not merely tolerate its Jewish communities; it allowed them to preserve their faith while becoming an integral part of the nation’s cultural life.

That history reflects something distinctive about India’s civilizational ethos. Hindu thought has long embraced the conviction that truth may be approached through multiple paths and that every human being possesses an inherent spiritual dignity. This worldview did not eliminate political conflict or social divisions, but it created a space for religious minorities, including Jews, to flourish without abandoning their identity.

As I reflected on my friend’s message, I was reminded of another enduring gift of Indian civilization: the Mahabharata. Like the Hebrew Bible, it is far more than an ancient narrative. It is a sustained meditation on power, justice, leadership, loyalty, and the moral burdens that accompany the defense of a people. Its questions remain startlingly contemporary because they address dilemmas that........

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