Israelin kadonneet heimot

Kiitos RV-lehdelle rakentavasta kritiikistä liittyen väitteeseen suomalaisista kadonneena Israelin sukukuntana (RV 49).

Puuhamiesten käyttämillä löyhillä kriteereillä ”juutalaisia” olisi kaikissa kansoissa luultavasti lähes miljardi henkeä, kun taas 5. Moos. 7:7 linjaa: ”Ei Herra sentähden ole mielistynyt teihin ja valinnut teitä, että olisitte lukuisammat kaikkia muita kansoja, sillä tehän olette kaikkia muita kansoja vähälukuisemmat.”

Esimerkiksi artikkelissa mainitun N-haplotyypin geenimerkin Wikipediasivuilla ei mainita lainkaan sanaa juutalaiset tai Israel. Pitää myös muistaa, että itänaapurimme joenvarsilla muun muassa suomensukuiset vepsäläiset olivat aikanaan enemmistönä kunnes tulivat työnnetyksi pohjoiseen.

Israelin sukukunta -kampanjointi turhentaa koko valitun kansan säilymisen ihmeen. Mikään toinen kansa ei säilyttänyt identiteettiään edes Juudan sukukunnan kohtaamasta Rooman ”Hajota ja hallitse” -mahtikäskystä. Keisari Klaudiuksen väestönlaskennassa 48 jKr. juutalaisia oli liki seitsemän miljoonaa, joista Irakin, Syyrian, Iranin ja Vähä-Aasian alueilla asui lähes miljoona kussakin (VRT. APT. 18:2).

Keisari Hadrianus pyrki tuomana jo paljon ennen Hitleriä "lopullisen ratkaisun" juutalaisongelmaan. Historioitsija Tacitus taas kirjoitti: "Idän ollessa assyrialaisten, meedialaisten ja persialaisten hallinnassa juutalaisia pidettiin heidän alamaisistaan kaikkein viheliäisimpinä". Kreikkalainen Strabos kirjoitti jo Jeesuksen aikaan, että oli vaikeaa löytää maan päältä paikkaa jossa "tätä heimoa" ei esiintyisi. Sibyllain kirjat taas valittavat, että kaikki maat ja meret ovat täynnä juutalaisia. Niin kauan kuin juutalaisia oli vähän, he saivat olla rauhassa. Mutta tuskin heitä oli tullut monta, kun heitä jo oli liian monta.

Josefus kirjoitti ensimmäisellä vuosisadalla eKr., että maanpakolaisia asui 'valtava joukko' Eufratin itäpuolella. Apokryfinen Toinen Esran kirja sanoo heidän kulkeneen Eufratin yli Arzarethiin. Tämä heprankielinen sana tarkoittaa kuitenkin vain 'toista maata', eikä siis ole paikannimi. Ironista on, että viimein Jerusalemin hävittänyt ja Juudankin hajaannukseen ripotellut Tiitus oli ensimmäinen Rooman keisari, joka peri keisariuden fyysiseltä isältään. Eräs toinenkin kun oli sanonut saaneensa vallan isältään.

Mauno Peltosen esseen mukaan (http://www.netikka.net/mpeltonen/heimot.htm) 1800 -luvulla Amerikassa esitettiin teorioita intiaanien hebrealaisesta alkuperästä. Arvattavasti juuri näistä teorioista Joseph Smith sai ideansa Mormonin kirjassa oleville tarinoilleen. Muutkaan teoriat kadonneesta kymmenestä sukukunnasta eivät ole kuolleet. Ehkä vahvimpana elää käsitys, jonka mukaan nämä heimot vaelsivat aikoinaan Brittein saarille leviten sieltä ympäri maailman. Milloin sana 'british' (BRIT-ISH) on hebreaa ja tarkoittaa 'Liiton kansaa', milloin Iberian niemimaa tulee sanasta Eber'ia (Heberia), milloin nimi European sanasta Jerobeam. Kirjallisuudessa elää erittäin villejä ja harhaanjohtavia väitteitä.

Suurin erä kadonneita sukukuntia karkotettiin islamistisista maista Israelin itsenäisyyssodan jälkeen vuosina 1948–1950, tyypillisesti ilman omaisuuttaan. Näistä 825 000 ihmisestä 600 000 muutti Israeliin, jossa ennen sotaa oli ollut vain 640 000 asukasta. Lähi-idän sefardijuutalaisten historia ulottuu Jerusalemin hävityksestä (70 jKr. ja 135 jKr.) vain 1400-luvun loppuun ja Espanjan karkotukseen. Karkotetut mizrahim-juutalaiset sen sijaan olivat aloittaneet diasporansa jo 2500 vuotta sitten.

Oikeat Israelin kadonneet sukukunnat eroavat suomalaisista siinä, että niitä on tyypillisesti diskriminoitu juutalaisina. Kuten juutalainen filosofi Heinrich Heine asian ilmaisi: "Juutalaisuus ei ole kansakunta. Juutalaisuus ei ole uskonto. Valitun osa on kantajalleen onnettomuus." Suomalaisiakin on kyllä
vainottu Venäjän aroilla, mutta ei juutalaisina, vaan tsushnina eli metsäläisinä.

PS. Nykyään juutalaiseksi itsensä tuntevat henkilöt ovat joko Juudan, Benjaminen tai Leevin sukukunnan jälkeläisiä. Israelissa on Shavei Israel -niminen laitos, joka virallisella tasolla selvittää kansojen yhteyksiä. Laitos on myöntänyt muun muassa Intiassa asuvalle heimolla virallisen statuksen Manassen sukukunnan edustajina ja tunnustanut toisaalta Etiopian falashat. 800-luvulla koko Etiopia oli juutalainen kuningaskunta jolla oli juutalainen kuningas. Suomesta laitos ei mainitse mitään. On huomionarvoista myös, että Babylonian Talmud kirjoitettiin nimenomana Babylonin pakkosiirtolaisuuteen jääneiden juutalaisten kesken.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/24323395/History
Kirjassa osoitetaan, miten tämä myytti kadonneena Israelin huoneena on jossain vaiheessa historiaa ollut nationalismin kulta-aikana sovitettu melkein jokaiseen valtioon.

Sillä on ollut ihmeen suuri poliittisen historian merkitys - vaikka Cromwellin ajan parlamentarismi contra kuningashuone

-Englannin kaltaisissa kysymyksissä väite on tietenkin ollut vailla historiallista pohjaa.

Täytyy todeta, että ainoa näyttö tässä uudessa Oxfordin painotalon kirjassa suomalaisten israelilaisista juurista on meidän käyttämisemme esimerkkinä siitä,

miten pitkälle kadonneiden jahtaamisessa voidaan mennä. Eli siellä on huvittunut kuvaus ruotsalaisen patriootin Rudbeck Jr:n halveeraavasta kuvauksesta vuodelta 1727

"Eestiläisten, suomalaisten ja lappalaisten alkuperästä", foorumina Acta Literalia Suecia.

"He provided (laughable) examples of Hebrewisms to be found in Scandinavian dialects and cultural practices that could be traced back to the Israelites."

Eli muualta pitää näyttö hakea kuin tästä kirjasta.

Kiehtovan pointin sen sijaan tarjoaa nk. Efraimin profetia.

Toiset ovat puhuneet suomalaisista isaskarilaisten jäänteenä, toiset efraimilaisten jäänteenä.

Eli Efraimin sukukunnan nimeä käytettiin VT:ssä toisinaan yleisnimenä koko pohjoisvaltiosta "Israelista" 10 heimoineen.

Sukukuntana Efraimista ennustettiin Hes 37:15-28 ja Jer 31:31, että tulee liittymään Uuden Liiton nimissä Juudan kanssa.

Profetia sanoo, että näistä Aabrahamin lupauksen jatkajista tulee "monia kansoja".

Genesis 48:17-19: "48:17 Mutta kun Joosef huomasi, että hänen isänsä laski oikean kätensä EFRAIMIN pään päälle,

pani hän sen pahakseen ja tarttui isänsä käteen siirtääkseen sen Efraimin pään päältä Manassen pään päälle.
48:18 Ja Joosef sanoi isälleen: "Ei niin, isäni, sillä tämä on esikoinen; pane oikea kätesi hänen päänsä päälle."
48:19 Mutta hänen isänsä epäsi ja sanoi: "Kyllä tiedän, poikani, kyllä tiedän; hänestäkin on tuleva kansa,

hänkin on tuleva suureksi, mutta hänen nuorempi veljensä on kuitenkin tuleva häntä suuremmaksi, ja hänen jälkeläisistään on tuleva kansan paljous."" (Melo-ha-Goyim)

Tämä goyim-termi liitetään nykyjuutalaisuudessa yleensä pakanakansoihin, joskin tarkoittaa kansakuntaa sinänsä.

Monikkomuodossa kuten tässä sitä ei käytetä Israelista , josta käytetään vain yksikköä (goy).

Tulkinta on, että hajaannuksessa "Efraim" on innovaattorina ja käymisaineena pakanakansoille, ei niin että se säilyisi eristyksessä ja perinnöllisesti puhtaana.

Hoosea 8:8: "Nielty on Israel. He ovat nyt pakanain seassa kelpaamattoman astian arvoiset.
Sillä Assuriin ovat he menneet - villiaasi, joka kulkee yksinänsä. Efraim ostelee lahjoilla rakasteluja."

Jospa nimenomaan ja erityisesti Efraim meni hässimään muiden kanssa vähäisillä estoilla?

Efraim näyttää kuitenkin olleen poikkeus sukukunnissa. Muut kyllä säilyisivät toiseen tapaan. Miten Päiviö Latvuus taas argumentoikaan "Efraimin" innovaattorin asemasta joonialaisten tieteen alkusysäyksessä tuolloin 700 eKr. teoksessaan "Ymmärryksen siivet - Miksi tiede on länsimaista?"

Joku on sitä mieltä että "efraimilaiset" olisivat vaikuttaneet empirismin nousuun, koska karkasivat pakoon ennen assyrialaisten hyökkäystä 722 eKr.

1 Makkabilaiskirje 12:5-23 rinnastaa jopa spartalaiset (lakedemonialaiset) ja israelilaiset keskenään ajalla VT:n jälkeen mutta ennen UT:ta:
http://jewsandjoes.com/mystery-of-the-gentiles.html
"Jonathan the high priest, and the elders of the nation, and the priests, and the other of the Jews, unto the Lacedemonians their brethren send greeting...It is found in writing, that the Lacedemonians and Jews are brethren, and that they are of the stock of Abraham..."

Makkabilaiskirja on tietysti Raamatun ulkopuolinen lähde, mutta hyvä tietää tästä koska on ilmestymässä kirkkoraamatun keskelle uudessa painoksessa kun apokryfit otetaan mukaan.

Voisikin sanoa, että tämä on yksi esimerkki apokryfikirjojen omituisuuksista tai jopa selvistä virheistä. Ei tällaisia eksplisiittisiä väittämiä ole Raamatun kirjoissa.

Esimerkiksi apokryfisessä Pietarin evankeliumissa ylösnousemusta kuvataan yksityiskohtaisesti, hyvän maun rajat ylittäen.

Kirkkoisä Hieronymus luonnehtikin apokryfisiä kirjoja hourailuksi, joiden kerronta on hurmioitunutta ja legendanmakuista.

VT:n 2 väenlasku-sensuksessa yhtäkkiä porukkaa on häipynyt Simeonin, Efraimin, Naftalin, Gaadin ja Ruubenin suvuista, Leevin luvun ollessa mysteeri.

Aseiässä olleista 22 tuhatta on hukassa kun vähentää pois mainitut joukkokuolemat.

Etenkin Simeonista on väkeä pois, kaikkiaan 37 000 sielua plus lapset, vanhukset ja naiset.

Ja kuinka ollakaan, 5 Moos 33 Mooses ei mainitse Simeonia lainkaan siunauksessaan kuolemaa tehdessään.

On spekuloita, että Simeoni liuhuparka oli lähtenyt tässä vaiheessa ja tästä spekulaatio että olisi ollut alkusysäys Spartan eristäytyneen soturikansan alusta.

Makkabilaiskirjeen kaltaista kirjeenvaihtoa Juudan ja Spartan välillä on säilynyt enemmänkin ja tästä on vedetty se konkluusio,

että Sparta ei olisi ainakaan jaafetilainen kansa ollut kreikkalaisten tapaan, vaan seemiläinen.

Joosefin surullisenkuuluisassa kaavussa oli "monia värejä".

Efraim lisäksi kattaisi monia kansakuntia käymisaineena, ei pelkästään jotain suomensukuisia.

Tässä tulkinnassa on tosin vähän vaikea käsittää, mitä tarkoittaa kaikkien näiden Israelin heimojen kerääminen takaisin luvattuun maahan.

VT kertoo, että nämä kaikki "12" (ml. Joosefin pojat ja Daan) heimoa sekoittuvat keskenään ainakin osin. Tässä kuvataan valtakunnan jako:
http://www.koivuniemi.com/cgi-bin/raamattuhaku?kirjat=2ai&hakuehto=11
2 Aik "Ja Juuda ja Benjamin olivat hänen.
11:13 Ja papit ja leeviläiset, mitä koko Israelissa oli, tulivat kaikilta alueiltaan ja asettuivat palvelemaan häntä....
11:16 Ja HEITÄ SEURASIVAT KAIKISTA ISRAELIN SUKUKUNNISTA Jerusalemiin ne, jotka sydämestään antautuivat etsimään Herraa, Israelin Jumalaa, uhratakseen Herralle, isiensä Jumalalle.
11:17 Näin he vahvistivat Juudan valtakuntaa ja tukivat Rehabeamia, Salomon poikaa, kolme vuotta; sillä he vaelsivat Daavidin ja Salomon teitä kolme vuotta."

Toisaalta Israelista paettiin Juudaan Assyrian tieltä. Toisaalta Iisebelin Baal-vainoissa paettiin. 2 Aik "31:6 Ja ne israelilaiset ja Juudan miehet, jotka asuivat Juudan kaupungeissa" 2 Aik 30:6 "Juoksijat kulkivat, mukanaan kuninkaan ja hänen päämiestensä kirjeet, halki koko Israelin ja Juudan ja julistivat kuninkaan käskystä: "Te israelilaiset, palatkaa Herran, Aabrahamin, Iisakin ja Israelin Jumalan, tykö, että hän palajaisi niiden tykö, jotka teistä ovat säilyneet ja pelastuneet Assurin kuningasten käsistä. "

Toisaalta myös Juudan kansalaisia vietiin Israelin joukossa jo 722 eKr. Assyriaan. 2 Kun. 18:13 "Kuningas Hiskian neljäntenätoista hallitusvuotena hyökkäsi Sanherib, Assurin kuningas, kaikkien Juudan varustettujen kaupunkien kimppuun ja valloitti ne. Niin Hiskia, Juudan kuningas, lähetti Assurin kuninkaalle Laakiiseen sanan: "Minä olen rikkonut, käänny pois minun kimpustani. Minä kannan, mitä panet kannettavakseni." Niin Assurin kuningas määräsi Hiskian, Juudan kuninkaan, maksettavaksi kolmesataa talenttia hopeata ja kolmekymmentä talenttia kultaa."

Mitä tästä opimme? Sen että Juudan valtiossa oli myös näiden Israelilaisten heimojen edustajia. Babylonian pakkosiirron jälkeen Juudan ja Israelin valtioiden nimiä jopa käytettiin vaihtoehtoisesti. Esra 8:35: "Ja vankeudesta tulleet pakkosiirtolaiset uhrasivat polttouhreiksi Israelin Jumalalle kaksitoista härkää koko Israelin puolesta, yhdeksänkymmentä kuusi oinasta, seitsemänkymmentä seitsemän karitsaa ja kaksitoista syntiuhrikaurista, kaikki polttouhriksi Herralle."
Esra 10:25 Israelilaisia: Paroksen jälkeläisiä Ramja, Jissia, Malkia, Miijamin, Elasar, Malkia ja Benaja;"
Nehemia 12:47 Ja koko Israel antoi Serubbaabelin ja Nehemian aikana veisaajille ja ovenvartijoille heidän osuutensa, heidän jokapäiväiset tarpeensa; he pyhittivät lahjoja myöskin leeviläisille, ja leeviläiset pyhittivät lahjoja Aaronin pojille."

ANTTI! Oletko huomannut, että Jeesuksen velipuoli Jaakob, alkuseurakunnan yksi "pylväs", osoitti kirjeellensä (Jaak 1:1) "12 sukukunnalle" jotka asuivat hajallaan kirjeen tavoittajien piirissä tuolloin noin 60 jKr? Eli Jaakob laski että palanneiden Juudan miesten joukossa olivat läsnä nuo 12 sukukuntaa. Toisaalta Josefus kirjoittaa, että kadonneita heimoja siirtyi itään, Eufratin tuolle puolen (Antiquities 11, luku 5). Samasta kirjoittavat Akiva ja Elieser 100 jKr Talmudissa (Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 110b). Tavallaan tämä kahden talon oppi on päinvastainen korvausteologialle jossa kirkko on korvannut Israelin tyystin. Siinä Israel on korvannut kirkon ja kristikunta kuvaa kadonneita heimoja.

KENESTÄ TULEE PATRIARKKA? Kysymys on kiehtova sille joka vähääkään ymmärtää eksponentiaalikuvaajasta. Tsingis-kaani Temujin eli vain 800 vuotta sitten, mutta tänään 0.53% maapallon miehistä on hänen jälkeläisiänsä suorassa polvessa. 16 miljoonaa miestä, plus naiset. Temujinista on aikaa 800 vuotta. Efraimista 3500 vuotta. Teoriassa on mahdollista, että sieltä on lähtenyt jotain mahtisonneja. Efraimista voisi periaatteessa tuon 2700 vuoden aikana voinut vaikka tulla tuo itse Temujin suorassa polvessa. On vaikea arvioida, kuka on elinvoimainen. Aika on mahtava parametri. Yllättävän mahtava. Eniten jälkeläisiä ajan saatossa ja kulttuurien tasolla tuottaa kuitenkin rakastava perhe, ei mikään Playboy-elämä.

Mutta emme me suomalaisetkaan mongoleja ole, vaikka Ruotsin tietosanakirjat näin 50-luvulle saakka väittivät... Gobineau kirjoitti 1850-luvulla että suomalaiset olivat Euroopan alin rotu, Pohjolan neekereitä joiden miehet eivät riemuinneet mistään niin paljon kuin siitä, jos ylemmän rodun edustaja tuli ja makasi heidän vaimonsa ja tyttärensä likaisissa kota-rakennuksissaan. Gobineau siis piti lyhytkasvuisia ja tummia lappalaisia suomalaisina ja hänen kriitikkonsa Rudolf Virchow matkusti Suomeen ja todisti kallotutkimustensa kanssa, että suomalaiset olivat vaaleampi kansa kuin saksalaiset. Siitä tuli Finnenfrage: Olivatko preussilaiset suomensukuisia, parjasivat muut baijerilaiset kiusallaan. Tänään tiedämme, että ruskeiden silmien, tummien hiusten ja kiharien hiusten dominoidessa perinnöllisyydessä tulee - aivan vakavasti - maailman viimeinen blondi asumaan Suomessa. Missään maapallolla ei ole niin paljon blondeja kuin (Länsi-)Suomessa. Jaafetin kulminaatiopiste on tarkalleen ottaen Ahvenanmaalla. No, sitä Ernst Haeckel ylistikin maapallon korkeammaksi roduksi. YK:n edeltäjä Kansainliitto toimi noina aikoina ja ainoa Kansainliiton juridinen päätös olikin Ahvenanmaan eli Oolannin rauhoittaminen suojaan maailman myrskyiltä. Demilitarinoinnista puhutaan. Vähän niin kuin kyyttölehmät Karjalassa.

Kauniiksi lopuksi, Herramme itse mainitsi että Hänet on lähetetty paimeneksi, etsimään "ISRAELIN huoneen kadonneet lampaat".

Eli Jeesus oli varsin tietoinen tästä kadonneiden heimojen kivusta juutalaisten tietoisuudessa.

Hän sanoi että on tullut etsimään ensisijaisesti koko Israelin "12" huoneen kadonneet,

sitten siitä eteenpäin Samariasta aina maan ääriin saakka. Mutta sekin samarian eli puolijuutalaisen sekakansan, kautta.

Samaria kuvaakin suurta herätystä evankeliumeissa (Joh 4) ja Apostolien teoissa.

12 apostolia lähetettiin tosiaan kauas ja monet orientaaliin itään sinne mystisen Eufratin taakse:
Andreas skyyttalaisten luo pohjoiseen Mustanmeren taakse.
Pietari Persiaan ja Egyptiin.
Bartolomeus Armenian, Turkin ja Iranin kautta Intiaan.
Tuomas parttilaisten luo, Afganistanin, Iranin ja Irakin kautta Intiaan.
Juuda Persiaan. jne.

Legend concerning the fate of the ten tribes constituting the northern Kingdom of Israel. The Kingdom of Israel, consisting of the ten tribes (the twelve *tribes excluding Judah and Benjamin who constituted the southern Kingdom of Judah), which fell in 722 B.C.E. and its inhabitants were exiled to “Halah and *Habor by the river *Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes” (II Kings 17:6 and 18:11; for details and conjectures as to their ultimate fate, see Assyrian *Exile), but in general it can be said that they disappeared from the stage of history. However, the parallel passage in I Chronicles 5:26 to the effect that the ten tribes were there “unto this day” and the prophecies of Isaiah (11:11), Jeremiah (31:8), and above all of Ezekiel (37: 19–24) kept alive the belief that they had maintained a separate existence and that the time would come when they would be rejoined with their brethren, the descendants of the Exile of Judah to Babylon. Their place in history, however, is substituted by legend, and the legend of the Ten Lost Tribes is one of the most fascinating and persistent in Judaism and beyond it.

The belief in the continued existence of the ten tribes was regarded as an incontrovertible fact during the whole period of the Second Temple and of the Talmud. *Tobit, the hero of the apocryphal book of his name, was depicted as a member of the tribe of Naphtali; the Testament of the 12 Patriarchs takes their existence as a fact; and in his fifth vision, IV Ezra (13:34–45) saw a “peaceable multitude… these are the ten tribes which were carried away prisoners out of their own land.”Josephus (Ant., 11:133) states as a fact “the ten tribes are beyond the Euphrates till now, and are an immense multitude and not to be estimated in numbers. Paul (Acts 26:6) protests to Agrippa that he is accused "for the hope of the promise made unto our fathers, unto which promise our twelve tribes, instantly serving God, hope to come,” while James addresses his epistle to “the twelve tribes which are scattered about” (1:1). The only opposing voice to this otherwise universal view is found in the Mishnah. R. Eliezer expresses his view that they will eventually return and “after darkness is fallen upon the ten tribes light shall thereafter dwell upon them,” but R. Akiva expresses his emphatic view that “the ten tribes shall not return again” (Sanh. 10:3). In consonance with this view, though it is agreed that Leviticus 26:38 applies to the ten tribes, where R. Meir maintains that it merely refers to their exile, Akiva states that it refers to their complete disappearance (Sifra, Be-H ̣ukkotai, 8:1).

Their inability to rejoin their brethren was attributed to the fact that whereas the tribes of Judah and Benjamin (the Kingdom of Judah) were “scattered throughout the world,” the ten tribes were exiled beyond the mysterious river *Sambatyon (Gen. R. 73:6), with its rolling waters or sand and rocks, which during the six days of the week prevented them from crossing it, and though it rested on the Sabbath, the laws of the Sabbath rendered the crossing equally impossible. According to the Jerusalem Talmud, however (Sanh. 10:6, 29c), the exiles were divided into three. Only one-third went beyond the Sambatyon, a second to “Daphne of Antioch,” and over the third “there descended a cloud which covered them”; but all three would eventually return. Throughout the Middle Ages and until comparatively recent times there were claims of the existence of the ten lost tribes as well as attempts by travelers and explorers, both Jewish and non-Jewish, and by many naive scholars, both to discover the ten lost tribes or to identify different peoples with them. In the ninth century *Eldad ha-Dani claimed not only to be a member of the tribe of Dan, but that he had communicated with four of the tribes. David *Reuveni claimed to be the brother of Joseph the king of the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh who were settled in Khaybar in Arabia, which was identified with the Habor of II Kings. Benjamin of Tudela has a long description of the ten tribes. According to him the Jews of Persia stated that in the town of *Nishapur dwelt the four tribes of Dan, Asher, Zebulun, and Naphtali, who were then governed “by their own prince Joseph Amarkala the Levite [ed. by N.M. Adler (1907), 83], while the Jews of Khaybar are of the tribes of Reuben and Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh" (ibid., 72), as was also stated by Reuveni.

Persistent was the legend that they warred with Prester John in Ethiopia, a story repeated by Obadiah of *Bertinoro in his first two letters from Jerusalem in 1488 and 1489. The kabbalist Abraham Levi the elder, in 1528, identified them with the Falashas (see *Beta Israel). Abraham *Farissol gives a long account of them based upon conversations with David Reuveni not to be found in the latter’s diary, while the most expansive is that of Abraham *Jagel, an Italian Jew of the 1600–1700 centuries, in the 22nd chapter of his Beit Ya’ar ha-Levanon. Jacob *Saphir (1822–1888) cherished the hope that he would discover the lost tribes. He tells the story in great detail of Baruch b. Samuel, a Jew of Safed who, sent to seek them, had visited Yemen and after traveling through an uninhabited desert established contact with a Jew who claimed to belong to the “sons of Moses.” However, Baruch was murdered before he could visit them ( Even Sappir, 1 (1866), 41), and in the following chapter Saphir transcribes word for word the evidence given by a certain Baruch Gad to the rabbis of Jerusalem in 1647 that he had met the “sons of Moses” in Persia, who gave him a letter to Jerusalem. He concludes wistfully, “Were I able to give full credence to this letter… I would subject it to a meticulous analysis and would learn from it matters of supreme importance, but the recollection of the fraud of Eldad ha-Dani brings suspicion upon Baruch the Gadite, for one supports the other… I have done my duty by putting the facts down and you may judge for yourselves and I will hear also what contemporary scholars say about it."

Various theories, one more farfetched than the other, have been adduced, on the flimsiest of evidence, to identify different peoples with the ten lost tribes. There is hardly a people, from the Japanese to the British, and from the Red Indians to the Afghans, who have not been suggested, and hardly a place, among them Africa, India, China, Persia, Kurdistan, Caucasia, the U.S., and Great Britain. Special interest is attached to the fantastic traveler’s tale told by Aaron (Antonio) Levi de *Montezinos who, on his return to Amsterdam from South America in 1644, told a remarkable story of having found Indians beyond the mountain passes of the Cordilleras who greeted him by reciting the Shema. Among those to whom Montezinos gave his affidavit was *Manasseh Ben Israel, then rabbi of Amsterdam, who fully accepted the story, and to it devoted his Hope of Israel (1650, 16522) which he dedicated to the English Parliament. In section 37 he sums up his findings in the following words: 1. That the West Indies were anciently inhabited by a part of the ten Tribes, which passed thither out of Tartary, by the Streight of Anian. 2. That the Tribes are not in any one place, but in many; because the Prophets have fore-told their return shall be into their Country, out of divers places; Isaiah especially saith it shall be out of eight. 3. That they did not return to the Second Temple. 4. That at this day they keep the Jewish Religion. 5. That the prophecies concerning their return to their Country, are of necessity to be fulfilled. 6. That from all coasts of the World they shall meet in those two places, sc. Assyria and Egypt; God preparing an easier, pleasant way, and abounding with all things, as Isaiah saith, ch. 49, and from thence they shall flie to Jerusalem, as birds to their nests. 7. That their Kingdom shall be no more divided; but the twelve Tribes shall be joined together under one Prince, that is under Messiah, the Son of David; and that they shall never be driven out of their Land."

The Latin work was translated into English the same year it was published, and ran through three editions in as many years, and Manasseh Ben Israel used this “evidence” of the dispersal of the Jews throughout the world as an argument to Oliver *Cromwell in his appeal to permit the return of the Jews to England, then the only country which had no Jews. As long as this situation existed, the fulfillment of the prophecy that the coming (or the second coming) of the Messiah would take place only when the Jews were scattered in the four quarters of the world (section 35). Both through the translation and the correspondence which the story initiated between Manasseh Ben Israel and theologians in England, it played a significant role in creating the atmosphere which eventually brought about the return of the Jews to England.

Bibliography: A. Neubauer, in: JQR, 1 (1889), 14–28, 95–114, 185–201, 408–23; A. Hyamson, ibid., 15 (1903), 640–76; C. Roth, A Life of Menasseh Ben Israel (1934), 178–93; A.H. Godbey, The Lost Tribes, a Myth (1930); L. Wolf, Menasseh Ben Israel’s Mission to Oliver Cromwell (1901), 17–56; D. Tamar, in: Sefunot, 6 (1962), 303–10. Add. Bibliography: H. Halkin, Across the Sabbath River: In Search of a Lost Tribe of Israel (2002); T. Parfitt, Lost Tribes of Israel (2003); idem, Thirteenth Gate, Travels among the Lost Tribes of Israel (1987). [Louis Isaac Rabinowitz]

The human genome refers to approximately three billion chemical letters (nucleotides) comprising the sequence of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) in almost every cell of each human being. There are four different nucleotides (adenine, guanine, cytosine, thymidine), such that each of the approximately three billion sites of the human DNA sequence comprising the human genome is occupied by one of these four nucleotide chemical letters. Human genome analysis has revealed that on the face of the planet, on average, any two individuals differ from each other at fewer than merely 0.1 % (1/10000) of these sites. (Pauli Ojala, note: Larger insertions or deletions called copy number variation contributes much more to the figure than the single nuclear polymorphisms.) These differences among individuals arise from inaccuracies during the process wherein DNA is replicated and transmitted from generation to generation. Furthermore, the pattern of variable sites is not randomly scattered across the 3 billion-nucleotide genome. Rather, certain combinations of variable sites are often transmitted in blocks known as haplotypes. DNA sequence variants are detected by genotyping or DNA sequencing methods. In the minority of cases, such variable sites may predispose to disease (disease-predisposing mutations), but for the most part they simply serve as “neutral DNA markers.” In addition to medical and forensic applications, DNA sequence variation markers are convenient for tracing shared ancestries, family relations, genealogic networks, migratory patterns, and geographic origins of individuals, communities, and populations. This discipline is called DNA sequence based phylogenetics or phylogeography. While analysis of the genome provides important insights with respect to population history, including Jewish origins and history – for both scientific and ethical reasons, such analysis does not provide an appropriate tool for establishing Jewish or any other religious or ethnic identity at an individual or community level. Scientifically, the variation in DNA sequence identity among Jews is too broad, and overlaps that of non-Jews sufficiently, so as to negate the concept of unique or characteristic genomic markers for Jews. Furthermore, Jewish identity is a concept based on tradition, law, culture, and custom, rather than on physical considerations, including DNA sequence. Attempts to use any biological markers to establish Jewish identity in individuals have been fraught with unwanted and tragic consequences in the past. Therefore, inferences regarding patterns of DNA sequence variation should be interpreted with great caution, with regard to both scientific and societal considerations.

DNA markers are distributed across all of the various distinct regions of the genome, which in humans consists of 22 pairs of autosomal chromosomes, the sex chromosomes (XX in females and XY in males), and mitochondrial DNA. Most of the genome is diploid, meaning that there is representation of each nucleotide site from both parents. However, the Y-chromosome of the genome in males, and mitochondrial DNA in both males and females are haploid, meaning that there is only representation from one parent (uniparental). In the case of the Y-chromosome, the DNA sequence including its variable site markers is transmitted only from fathers to their sons. In the case of mitochondrial DNA, the DNA sequence including its variable site markers is transmitted only from mothers to both their male and female offspring. (Pauli Ojala note: Some mitochondrial DNA is also ihnerited from the father, it seems.) Furthermore, at these uniparentally inherited haploid regions the genome is free of a process called recombination, which does occur at the diploid regions of the genome. Recombination shuffles markers between the two parental copies at corresponding genomic regions.

For most of the length of the Y-chromosome (the nonrecombining or NRY region) and for the entire mitochondrial DNA, no recombination occurs. Thus, analysis of DNA markers on the NRY region of the Y-chromosome and mitochondrial DNA has emerged as a powerful tool in phylogenetics of male and female lineages respectively. Markers outside of these haploid regions have also been used in genome based phylogeographic analysis. However, the dual inheritance, with biparental presentation together with recombination, renders the interpretation of shared ancestry and phylogenetics more complex and often ambiguous. It should be noted, that when DNA sequence variants anywhere in the genome are disease predisposing mutations, differences in their frequency among Jewish communities in comparison with non-Jews can contribute to certain health and disease epidemiologic patterns (see *Genetic Diseases in Jews). The current entry will be divided into a description of genomic analysis of Jewish populations along male and female lineages, followed by an integrated overview.

The molecular principles described above have been usefully applied to the evolutionary studies of humankind as a whole, as well as to the phylogenetics of various populations of interest. These studies address questions related to geographic origins, ancestry, history, migration, and demography of populations. Likewise, it is possible to phrase similar questions with regard to the parental ancestry of contemporary Jews. To do so, it is necessary, first, to delineate accepted nomenclatures and classifications for Jewish communities and second, to clarify how the use of different classes of genetic markers enables distinct questions of interest to be addressed. To this end, contemporary Jews can be considered as descending from two large population groups which had somewhat separate demographic histories during the past approximately two millennia.

These are the Ashkenazi and non-Ashkenazi groups, which in turn are comprised of numerous different communities. It is clear that this division oversimplifies the relations and hierarchy between the various Jewish communities. Thus the Ashkenazi population of Europe , which refers to Jews whose recent ancestry traces to Central and Eastern Europe, is often regarded as one population subgroup, despite clearly being composed of multiple communities. This classification has emerged because of shared adherence to similar religious rituals, liturgical style, and the shared use of the Yiddish language, and geographic location in Central and Eastern Europe. Of relevance to phylogenetics was the practice of a high level of endogamy, wherein Ashkenazi Jews married within the population subgroup. The non-Ashkenazi population subgroup is a much more culturally and geographically diverse population. The majority of the non-Ashkenazi population is composed of communities that resided in the Near and Middle East, North Africa, and geographic locations to which the Jews fled following the Iberian expulsions, beginning in 1492 C.E. These communities share similar religious rituals, most probably due to their presumed common historical origin from a gradual movement of Babylonian Jews, and are sometimes collectively referred to as the “Sephardi (Spanish)” or “Mizrah ̣i (Eastern)” Jews. In the current entry, we shall adhere to this convention though, where appropriate, based on available information, the term “Spanish exile” will refer to members of Jewish communities descended from the Iberian expulsions, and shall use the term “non-Ashkenazi” when the detailed geographic origin does not permit a more precise description. Moreover, neither the term “Sephardi” nor “Mizrah ̣i” takes into account some additional Jewish communities such as some of the Italian, Georgian, Yemenite, and Indian communities.

Following the foregoing definitions, two complementary sets of questions arise. First, what is the overall pattern of the contemporary NRY and mitochondrial DNA sequence variation at the level of the entire Jewish population in comparison to non-Jews, and of individual population subgroups or communities? More specifically this set of questions relates to our overall ability to trace recent or contemporary Jewish communities to a particular geographic origin such as the Near East, and allows analysis of parameters such as admixture and gene flow with Diaspora host populations. Second, DNA marker analysis enables clarification of micro-evolutionary mechanisms and events that have shaped the population history of each of the Jewish communities. These include the actual number of founding ancestors, their rate of expansion, their most likely geographic origin, and the level of identity between the various Jewish founding ancestors in different Jewish communities. The answers to both sets of questions are addressed separately for paternal and maternal population history, using the NRY-region of the Y-chromosome and mitochondrial DNA respectively, and in some cases these are expected to yield different patterns. To gain a clearer understanding of the way in which these questions can be addressed, it is important to clarify the different kinds of DNA sequence variation markers that are available for analysis, and the ways in which they can be combined to generate phylogenetic trees, with different levels of temporal resolution. Haplogroups are generally defined by a series of hierarchically arranged stable variations or polymorphisms in DNA sequence (usually at a single nucleotide site and hence termed single nucleotide polymorphisms or SNPs) that have usually occurred only once in the course of human evolution.

These are binary or bi-allelic, since there are only two variants in the human population, rather than multiple different variants. Numerous such binary sites are located throughout the NRY, and when combined they define major haplogroups. Individuals belonging to the same NRY haplogroup share common paternal ancestry at a level of resolution and timeframe that is a function of the number and choice of such binary sites. In the case of mitochondrial DNA, these binary sites are usually located in the portion of the circular mitochondrial DNA genome that is termed the coding region, and these define maternal haplogroups. Haplogroups enable the most basic level of phylogenetic assignment of humans into populations on the basis of shared paternal or maternal ancestry and hence phylogeographic origin. Such haplogroup analysis has been used to trace African origins and subsequent major migration routes for all anatomically modern humans on the planet. In the case of paternal haplogroups, defined by binary markers on the NRY, these have been given designations of major haplogroups A through R, based on the use of a few dozen binary markers, and each such haplogroup can be further refined and subdivided into a hierarchical tree of subhaplogroups, using many additional binary markers. These subhaplogroups are given additional lower case letter and number designations. As an example, NRY haplogroups A and B are dominant in Africa and absent in the Americas.

Of relevance to the origin of Jewish populations, the Near East as a whole is populated by a varied mix of major haplogroups among which the most frequent are E and J. Similarly the mitochondrial major haplogroups are designated by letters A through Z, and then again further subdivided using numbers and lower case letters, using additional coding region binary markers. In the case of mitochondrial DNA haplogroups, the major L haplogroup is dominant in Africa and absent in the Americas. Of relevance to Jewish population origins, and as is the case for the Y-chromosome, the Near East is populated with a long list of major mitochondrial haplogroups, among which H, J, T, U, and K are frequent. It is important to emphasize that the most common major haplogroups can be found across very large geographic expanses, and in turn comprise numerous lineages that usually coalesced many thousand years ago. Lineages refer to branches within a given haplogroup or subhaplogroup which can be related to each other by additional classes of DNA sequence variation markers. Many such additional classes of markers exist, and together they are distinguished from haplogroup defining binary markers in several ways. First, there may be more than two variants – such as in the case of simple tandem repeat markers (STRs) on the NRY. Also, they represent DNA sequence mutation events which may occur at a much more rapid rate compared to haplogroup defining binary markers, and as such may also have occurred at a given site repeatedly many times in human history, as occurs in the D-loop or control region of mitochondrial DNA. Such repeat markers are often said to define haplotypes within haplogroups, or lineages. Thus a phylogenetically defined lineage represents a cluster of related evolving haplotypes within a haplogroup. As noted, a haplogroup at any level of binary marker resolution is composed of numerous such coalescing lineages, whose relatedness can be determined using analysis of haplotypedefining repeat markers. Thus, while documentation or comparison of haplogroup frequencies within or among populations of interest provides important information regarding large but specific geographic origins, this does not effectively allow determination of the real number of ancestral parental lineages that gave rise to the present-day diversity in a population.

This can be likened to the hands on a clock, in which haplogroups are like the hour hand, and haplotypes are like the minute hand, and a lineage represents a given number of minutes within the interval defined by the hour hand. There is a slight difference in the way haplotypes are measured and determined for the NRY and for mitochondrial DNA, with a greater emphasis on the use of STRs in the case of the NRY, and use of D-loop sequence variants in the case of mitochondrial DNA. The advantage of using haplotype-defining repeat markers is invaluable in the study of the genomic structure of population groups, since they evolve quickly enough to trace recent historical events from DNA samples of extant living individuals. It is this genomic tool which has provided several important insights regarding Jewish populations, whose demographics and histories had previously been described on the basis of oral tradition, archival records, linguistic and liturgical analysis. Analysis of the genome has provided a complementary tool to these more classical approaches, and yielded additional insights.

The first recorded studies at the level of the genomic DNA sequence variation appeared in 1993, and compared Sephardi and Ashkenazi Jews in comparison to non-Jewish Czech males. These reported that the two Jewish population subgroups show a great similarity of NRY DNA marker frequencies, and appear to show very little evidence for admixture with host non-Jewish neighbors. Of interest, comparison with Lebanese non-Jews supported the notion of a shared Near East origin for both Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jewish population subgroups examined. Studies over the subsequent decade utilized progressively larger and more diverse sample sets, and a greater number of DNA sequence markers. Taken together this decade of work on the NRY markers strongly supports the hypothesis that the paternal gene pool of Jewish communities from Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East descended from a common Near Eastern ancestral population, and suggest that most Jewish communities have remained relatively isolated from neighboring non-Jewish communities during and after the Diaspora. The two most prevalent major NRY haplogroup affiliations shared among all Jewish communities are those denoted J and E. Further research based on haplogroup markers has shown that, with some notable rare exceptions, the NRY chromosome pool of both Ashkenazi Jews and non-Ashkenazi Jews originates as an integral part of the genetic landscape of the Near East. Further analysis at the haplotype level suggested that the pattern of haplotype differentiation within these shared haplogroups differs between the Jewish population and non-Jewish Near Eastern populations. This is entirely consistent with a shared remote Near East origin but subsequent separation of the ancestors of contemporary Jews from their non-Jewish Near East shared ancestral population. Such separation involved the establishment of a separate ethnic identity and restriction in marital admixture. The separation would have been accentuated by migration of the Jewish population from the Near East and into other parts of the world, during the Diasporas. In others words, the biological events leading to the emergence of the major haplogroups observed in Jews and non-Jews with whom they share common Near East ancestry are much older than the populations in which these haplogroups are found.

While the similar and shared Near Eastern background at the haplogroup level predates the ethnogenesis in the region, the haplotype structure is more recent and has evolved after the establishment of the Jews as a population group. To date, the Ashkenazi subpopulation of the Jews has been studied in the greatest detail, though there is a steadily increasing accumulation of comparably detailed genomic information for non- Ashkenazi communities. In the most detailed paternal phylogenetic study of the Ashkenazi to date by Behar and Skorecki in collaboration with an international team of scientific colleagues, a detailed resolution of the haplogroup structure according to the Y Chromosome Consortium recommendations was obtained. Based on the genotyping results, the Ashkenazi haplogroups were divided into the following three categories: major founder haplogroups, minor founder haplogroups, and shared haplogroups. The first two categories included those haplogroups likely to be present in the founding Ashkenazi population (and that now occur at high and low frequency respectively). The latter category is comprised of haplogroups that either entered the Ashkenazi Jewish gene pool recently as the result of introgression from European host populations, and/or that were present in both European and Jewish populations before the dispersal of the ancestral Ashkenazi population through Europe.

Haplogroup E-M35 and haplogroup J-12f2a fit the criteria for major Ashkenazi Jewish founding subhaplogroups, because they are widespread both in Ashkenazi Jewish communities and in Near Eastern populations, and occur at much lower frequencies in European non-Jewish populations. Subhaplogroups G-M201 and Q-P36 show a similar pattern, but are found at lower frequency, and are therefore considered to have been part of the founding paternal Ashkenazi Y-chromosome pool. It has not yet been established if these minor subhaplogroups are shared with non-Ashkenazi Jews. The best candidates for subhaplogroups that entered the Ashkenazi Jewish population more recently via admixture from the neighboring European populations include I-P19, R-P25, and R-M17. Taken together these results confirmed that the majority of NRY haplogroups found among contemporary Ashkenazi Jews originated in the Near East, with an approximately 8% introgression from non-Jewish European populations. Two events of interest seem to have made very specific independent contributions to this minor degree of introgression, and these will be described in the subsequent section. However, overall genomic analysis provides definitive evidence refuting a major contribution to the Ashkenazi Y-chromosome pool of any large scale entry into the population from the Caucasus, the putative geographic location of the Khazarian Kingdom, or from any other European or Eurasian source population.

While a study of this detail in non-Ashkenazi communities is still to be done, multiple lines of evidence from the genomic literature strongly support a common Near Eastern paternal origin for all Jewish communities, with low levels of introgression from neighboring non-Jews in the Diasporas. These findings also provided the backdrop for detailed analysis of lineages to clarify demographic patterns and microevolutionary forces that have shaped the detailed population structure of different Jewish communities and Jewish population subgroups. A number of illustrative examples are provided herein.

Phylogenetic analysis is based upon relatedness of individuals within a group. Genetic analysis has confirmed that all of humankind is phylogenetically related as descendents of a common maternal and paternal ancestor. In some societies, extensive records are maintained which document relationships and establish pedigrees extending over many generations, and this information can be used to facilitate genomic studies. While such biparental pedigree information is not available extending back to the early history of the Jewish people, there exists an oral tradition which may provide information about shared paternal ancestry, which has proven to be of interest, and must be taken into account in phylogenetic studies of Jews. In particular, a long-established system of Jewish male tribal or caste affiliation categorizes Jewish men into three groups: Jewish *priests or kohanim, *levites, and Israelites.

Within the Jewish community, membership in the male castes noted above, is determined by patrilineal descent. Kohanim are, in biblical tradition, the descendants of Aaron, who along with his brother Moses was a male descendant of Levi, the third son of biblical patriarch Jacob. According to the same tradition, Levites are considered to be those remaining male descendants of Levi who are not kohanim. These categories are recognized and affiliations of individual Jewish males to one of the three castes is widely known in virtually all Jewish communities, including Sephardi, Ashkenazi, and other. More specifically, self-identification with the Jewish priestly caste reflects an oral tradition of transmission by inheritance from father to son with no halakhically sanctioned mechanism for introgression of males who are not descendents along the paternal line from the founder of this male dynasty. Accordingly, this tradition carries with it specific scientific predictions based on the molecular genomics of the Ychromosome. Since, as noted, the Y-chromosome is also transmitted from fathers only to their male offspring, it is predicted that the Y-chromosome of historically and geographically dispersed priests should have a significantly greater similarity of DNA sequence markers compared to Y-chromosomes of other groups. Comprehensive clarification of the patterns of paternal relatedness, based on NRY marker analysis, requires combining haplogroup with haplotype analysis, to trace actual lineages. Indeed, several research studies beginning in 1997, and carried out over many years and across several continents, reveal a statistically significant greater degree of similarity of such NRY markers among contemporary Jewish priests compared to other groups tested. This similarity applied equally when tested across Ashkenazi and non-Ashkenazi communities.

This finding has been durable and has withstood the test of a decade of verification. Utilization of NRY STR markers, whose rate of change occurs at a surmised rapid pace, enabled the tracing of lineages and also determination of lineage coalescence times, in order to bracket an approximate timeframe for the establishment of this patrilineal Jewish priestly dynasty. Thus for example, using a set of six STR markers (DYS19, DYS388, DYS390, DYS391, DYS392, and DYS393), a single haplotype, termed the Cohen Modal Haplotype, was found to be the most frequent, and to be shared among priests from both the non-Ashkenazi and Ashkenazi communities. The scores (corresponding to the number of repeats in each named STR marker respectively) for this six-STR haplotype are 14, 16, 23, 10, 11, and 12 and are now known to belong to NRY haplogroup j, which, as noted above, is the most frequent haplogroup in the Near East and among Jews in particular. In a 1998 study, the modal haplotype frequencies were found to be 0.449 and 0.561 for the Ashkenazi and Sephardi kohanim, respectively.

The corresponding modal frequencies for the Ashkenazi and Sephardi Israelites in this same study were found to be 0.132 and 0.098, respectively. This lower frequency highlights the difference in criteria for overall Jewish affiliation compared to affiliation with the Jewish priesthood. Overall Jewish identity, since at least talmudic times (100 B.C.E.–500 C.E.) has traditionally been acquired either by descent from a Jewish woman, or alternatively by rabbinically authorized conversion, without the need to establish descent from a common male (or female) ancestor. In contrast as noted above, affiliation to the Jewish priesthood was restricted along patrilineal lines of descent. The use of one-step mutation haplotypes, termed the Cohen Modal Cluster, allowed the calculation of the coalescence to the most common recent ancestor by standard accepted mutation rates. This calculation gave an estimate of approximately 106 generations, which for a generation time of 25 years gives an estimated range which brackets a mean of 2,650 years before the present. These results establish the common origin of the Jewish priesthood caste in the Near East, coinciding with a timeframe beginning at approximately the biblically attributed date of the exodus from Egypt and extending to the Temple period. However, it should be noted that such dating estimates are based on numerous inherent assumptions and carry with them a wide error margin. The availability of more binary as well as STR markers for the NRY is now enabling further refinement at both the haplogroup and haplotype levels, and these numerical estimates may change based on future genome analysis. Furthermore, the discovery of a modal haplotype and cluster is based on statistical analysis, and does not permit specific validation of priestly status for a given individual. The latter depends upon cultural, religious, and social considerations which are not related to genome analysis for a given individual.

Of interest, the same studies in 1997 and 1998 found high frequencies of multiple haplogroups in the levites, indicating that no single recent origin could be inferred for the majority of this group, despite an oral tradition of a patrilineal descent similar to that of the kohanim (with some exceptions outlined in talmudic tractate *Bekhorot). This led to a more detailed NRY analysis of the levites. In particular, given the importance of the paternally defined levite caste in Jewish history, together with multiple theories of the ethnogenesis of the Ashkenazi Jewish community, and a suggestion that Yiddish is a re-lexified Slavic tongue, Behar and Skorecki, together with an international team of scientific collaborators, reported in 2003 a detailed investigation of the paternal genetic history of Ashkenazi levites. They compared the results with matching data from neighboring populations among which the Ashkenazi community lived during its formation and subsequent demographic expansion. The finding clearly demonstrated among the Ashkenazi levites, a major tightly clustered lineage within NRY haplogroup R-M17, which comprises 74% of Ashkenazi levites within this haplogroup and 52% of Ashkenazi levites overall. The presence of the R-M17 haplogroup within Ashkenazi levites is striking for several reasons. Firstly, this haplogroup is found at high frequency in the Ashkenazi levites but not in Sephardi levites, nor any other geographically or religiously designated Jewish grouping examined to date.

This means that a large and closely related subgroup of the Ashkenazi levites and the Sephardi levites differ in paternal ancestry. This is a very different pattern from that observed among the kohanim. Second, the STR marker-based haplotypes within this Ashkenazi levite haplogroup form an exceedingly tight phylogenetic cluster, indicative of a very recent origin from a single common ancestor. Coalescence calculation following the same principles used for the Cohen Modal Haplotype point to a founding event that occurred approximately 1,000 years before the present, with the same caveats regarding time estimates based on genomic analysis as were pointed out above. Third, the haplogroup is extremely rare in other Jewish groups and in non-Jewish groups of Near Eastern origin, but is found at high frequency in populations of East European origin. This contrasts with the Cohen Modal Haplotype, which belongs to a haplogroup that is abundant in the Near East. For the reasons stated above, it is likely that the event leading to a high frequency of R-M17 Y-chromosomes within the Ashkenazi levites involved very few, and possibly only one, founding paternal ancestor. The question then arises regarding the possible origins of the founder(s). Haplogroup R-M17 is found at very low frequency in other Jewish groups.

It is possible, therefore, that this haplogroup was also present at very low frequency among the levites present within the Ashkenazi founding community, followed by exceeding reproductive success, rendering the descendents of one such Levite, with this rare haplogroup, more numerous. Likewise, the haplogroup is also found at very low frequency within some populations of Near Eastern origin. It is therefore also possible that a conversion event prior to the establishment of the Ashkenazi founding population led to the founding of this haplogroup and its subsequent emergence at high frequency within the Ashkenazi levites. While it is not possible to formally refute either of these two possible explanations, it would be a remarkable coincidence that the geographic origins and demographic expansion of the Ashkenazi levites are within northern and eastern Europe and that this haplogroup is found at very high frequency within neighboring non- Jewish populations of European origin, but not at high frequency elsewhere. An alternative explanation, therefore, would postulate a founder(s) of non-Jewish European ancestry, whose descendents were able to assume levite status. While neither the NRY haplogroup composition of the majority of Ashkenazi Jews nor the STR haplotype composition of he R-M17 haplogroup within Ashkenazi levites is consistent with a major Khazar or other European origin for the Ashkenazi community, as has been speculated by some scholars, one cannot rule out the important contribution of a single or a very few individual male founders from the Khazarian or another Eurasian population group among contemporary Ashkenazi levites. A similar study focusing on non-Ashkenazi levites is yet to be carried out, and will no doubt shed additional light on the detailed paternal lineages comprising contemporary levites.

DUTCH JEWS AND LEMBA. Two additional illustrative examples of geographic rather than caste designation can be given wherein genomic analysis of NRY marker variation has provided insights of relevance to Jewish population history. NRY analysis of Ashkenazi Dutch Jewish males has shown that approximately 25% of their NRY chromosomes belong to the most prevalent haplogroup in Western Europe and one that is rare in the Near East, R-P25. Therefore, when various indices of genetic distances are measured between this Ashkenazi community and the non-Jewish host population, greater similarities are observed, reflecting more substantial male-origin gene flow from the host population to the Ashkenazi Dutch community. This is consistent with greater religious tolerance which may have characterized Dutch society. Interestingly, the pattern of this possible introgression is different from that observed for the R-M17 haplogroup described for the levites. The genetic distances between the haplotypes comprising haplogroup R-P25 in contemporary Ashkenazi Dutch Jews coalesce prior to the migration of Jews to Europe and therefore are likely explained by repetitive introgression events (admixture) of European non-Jewish males into this community. Another group of interest has been the *Lemba tribes of Southern Africa. While not identified as Jews in religious or halakhic terms, these individuals relate an oral tradition of descending from a group of men who migrated via the Hadramout from the ancient kingdom of Judea in the Near East. Following their eventual settlement in their current villages, located in modern-day South Africa, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe, the Lemba founders are said to have intermarried with local Bantu-speaking women, and to have adopted the language and many cultural practices of their neighbors. However, they also maintained some traditions, reminiscent of a Near East and Jewish origin. Genomic analysis of NRY markers at the haplogroup and haplotype level indeed confirmed a pattern of admixture, with clear-cut evidence of Y-chromosomes of Near East origin in a substantial number of Lemba males, with frequencies approaching those found in some Ashkenazi and Sephardi Diaspora Jewish communities, with a strikingly high frequency of Lemba males with the Cohen Modal Haplotype.

These are virtually absent among the non-Lemba neighboring populations. More detailed STR-based lineage and coalescence analysis with a large number of markers could provide additional insights of historical interest. Additional studies have been done, and are continuing to focus on the mechanisms that shaped the population genomic structure of the remaining majority of Jewish groups and communities. Questions of special interest amenable to this type of analysis include these: how limited is the number of founders which gave rise to the contemporary global Jewish population? Do Ashkenazi and various non-Ashkenazi Jewish populations share overlapping or distinct founding lineages?

Can geographic origins for each of the Jewish haplogroups be determined with greater accuracy? Studies carried out between 2002 and 2004 have provided some initial information in this regard. By focusing initially on the Ashkenazi population and investigating the STR marker variation within each of the founding haplogroups, Behar and Skorecki, together with an international group of scientific collaborators, confirmed previous findings that Ashkenazi Jews show high levels of haplogroup diversity compared with their non-Jewish counterparts. However, a vastly reduced number of haplotypes within Ashkenazi Jewish haplogroups, as well as reduced haplotype variance within haplogroups, was clearly observed. What do these contrasting patterns tell us about the possible role of a bottleneck in the Ashkenazi population? Despite the fact that Ashkenazi Jews represent a recently founded population in Europe, they appear to derive from a large and diverse ancestral source population in the Near East, a population that may have been larger than the source population from which European non-Jews derived. This is consistent with the finding that contemporary Ashkenazi Jews display higher levels of haplogroup diversity than European non-Jewish populations.

The reduced haplotype diversity within Ashkenazi Jewish haplogroups compared to non-Jewish populations may be the signature of a founder event/population bottleneck in the Ashkenazi population history. Indeed, the extremely low STRbased haplotype diversity of some of the less frequent founding haplogroups (e.g., NRY haplogroups R-M17, Q-P36) suggest a single male lineage expansion comprising most or all of these and other haplogroups in Ashkenazi Jews. Comparable analyses have yet to be carried out for the many non-Ashkenazi communities. In addition, the study demonstrated that the many different Ashkenazi communities in Central and Eastern Europe cannot be readily distinguished from each other either at the haplogroup or haplotype level, based on genetic markers at both the haplogroup and haplotype levels.

This can be attributed to a common origin from a shared ancestral deme and due to continuous migration among the Ashkenazi communities, and is entirely consistent with nongenetic disciplines identifying all Ashkenazi communities as a relatively homogeneous population.

The available data on the maternally inherited mitochondrial DNA in Jewish communities is still scant, but is being collected at a rapid rate as DNA sequencing and genotyping technology improves, and is also fueled by the interest of the public in genealogic questions. An initial study, which focused only on a region of the D-loop of mitochondrial DNA known as hypervariable sequence 1 (HVs-1), demonstrated greatly reduced mitochondrial DNA diversity in the Jewish populations in comparison with the host populations, together with a wide range of different modal haplotypes specific to each of the different communities. The results indicated specific founding events in the Jewish populations. A simple explanation for this exceptional pattern of mitochondrial variation across Jewish populations was that each of the different Jewish communities is composed of descendants of a small group of maternal founders. After the establishment of these communities, inward gene flow from the host populations must have been very limited. As the study focused on haplotype diversity and did not include deep haplogroup analysis, a putative origin of each of the founding lineages was not suggested. A subsequent study conducted by Behar and Skorecki, together with an international group of scientific collaborators, focused in greater detail on the Ashkenazi population using a large set of samples from descendents of numerous communities across Europe, and utilized markers which permitted deep phylogeographic analysis at the mitochondrial haplogroup and haplotype levels. The analysis of Ashkenazi mitochondrial sequence variation portrays a pattern of highly reduced diversity, with an unusually large proportion of haplotypes that are unique to the Ashkenazi gene pool, and a reduction in frequency of rare haplotypes and singleton sites compared with both European and Near Eastern populations. At the haplogroup level, the Ashkenazi mitochondrial DNA variation was found to have a number of peculiarities. For example, in two separate studies nearly ten years apart, haplogroup K appears as the most common haplogroup, with its frequency almost an order of magnitude greater than among European or Near Eastern non-Jewish populations. More detailed sequence analysis enabled the construction of mitochondrial DNA-based phylogenetic networks, which resolved the haplogroup K samples into three separate lineages, whose phylogeographic origins are thought to antedate by far the founding of the Ashkenazi population.

Furthermore, mitochondrial DNA haplogroup N1b, rare in most European populations, was found to comprise nearly 10% of the Ashkenazi mitochondrial DNA pool, and strikingly, haplotype analysis of this N1b haplogroup in Ashkenazi Jews revealed only a single lineage. These Ashkenazi mitochondrial DNA lineages were virtually absent from surrounding non-Jewish populations, and therefore provide a genetic signature of the Ashkenazi maternal gene pool, and bear witness to the strong effects of genetic drift acting on this population. Similar to the observation for male ancestry based on Y-chromosome analysis in the Ashkenazi population, the mitochondrial DNA results also show that the various Ashkenazi communities throughout Central and Eastern Europe cannot be readily distinguished from each other, likely reflecting shared recent origins from a common small ancestral deme, followed by continuous migration among the Ashkenazi communities.

Micro-Evolutionary Mechanisms that Have Shaped Mitochondrial DNA Sequence Variation in Jewish Communities

Based on the foregoing, and with the development of advanced technological approaches to facilitate DNA sequence analysis, the highest possible level of maternal phylogeographic resolution can be obtained from compete sequencing of the entire approximately 16,500 nucleotides of mitochondrial DNA from samples of interest. Recent studies by Behar and Skorecki and their international scientific collaborators, as well as other research groups, are utilizing such an approach in an attempt to shed light on the absolute number of individual women who gave rise to the lineages among Ashkenazi Jews, to shed light on their putative origin. Based on the complete sequencing analysis in Ashkenazi Jews and existing complete sequences from non-Jews, the exact phylogenetic branches in which the Ashkenazi lineages could be traced were identified. The new information was used to screen a global set of haplogroup K samples to include or exclude them from these Ashkenazi lineages.

The results showed that the Ashkenazi lineages were virtually absent in other populations, with the important exception of low frequencies among non-Ashkenazi Jews. These results indicate that the three Ashkenazi haplogroup K lineages are virtually restricted to this population, and are likely to be of Near Eastern rather than European origin. The same approach was followed for mitochondrial DNA haplogroup N1b, and concluded that for this haplogroup all samples belong to one expanding lineage. Taken together, these four lineages indicate that four individual women gave rise to fully 40% of contemporary Ashkenazi Jews, or approximately 3.5 million people. The coalescence times for the expansion of these four lineages coincide well with the historical timeframe of less than 2,000 years for Ashkenazi population expansion from a small founding deme, providing the most powerful and detailed information about the maternal Ashkenazi population founding event. Similar studies in non-Ashkenazi Jewish communities remain to be carried out, and should provide comparable information regarding absolute numbers of founding maternal lineages, as well as their approximate founding dates and possible ancestral locations.

Integration of the Paternal and Maternal Genetic History Taken together, the data available from Y-chromosome and mitochondrial DNA phylogenetic analysis of Jewish populations has been very informative in uncovering patterns and mechanisms that complement information gleaned from more conventional historical, linguistic, archival, liturgical, and archeological approaches. Furthermore, NRY and mitochondrial DNA markers continue to be used to seek possible Near East origins for communities which claim shared remote ancestry with the majority of Jewish population groups (socalled “Lost Tribes”). At the population level it seems that the genetic histories of the maternal and paternal ancestors tell different stories about population genomic structure of the Jews. Y-chromosome genomic analysis strongly points to a common origin in the Near East while the genetic data from the mitochondrial DNA point to separate local events with a putative geographic origin that might or might not be in the Near East. Y-chromosome and mitochondrial DNA analyses are congruent in suggesting that a limited number of founding ancestors gave rise to the various Jewish communities, with remarkably low levels of introgression from the host populations.

It is also clear that many questions remain unanswered and the scope of future studies is potentially very large. Data on the non-Ashkenazi population is needed to answer more accurately questions pertaining to the mechanisms that have shaped each of the communities and the possible connection among them and with the Ashkenazi and host populations. It is important to note that information gleaned from the study of the haploid regions of the genome provide information that is of relevance to population level genomic effects. Population level effects, such as founder and bottleneck events, influence overall patterns of DNA sequence variation across the genome as a whole. Thus a founder effect, followed by population expansion, may lead to the drift to high frequencies of specific disease-predisposing or phenotype-modifying sequence variants at other parts of the genome. However, they do not substitute for direct analysis at these diploid and autosomal regions of the genome in ascertaining mutations.

Furthermore, recombination, which characterizes the pattern of inheritance at the diploid regions of the genome, accounts for the influence of even small degrees of admixture of Jews with their non-Jewish neighbors on diverse traits or phenotypes that are determined by DNA sequence variation throughout the genome. This partly explains some of the differences in physical features that may be noted among Jewish communities, despite common ancestral origins, and high levels of intra-community endogamy. Interestingly, recently it has been shown that in other parts of the genome as well, there may be regions of limited recombination, or regions in which DNA sequence variation markers are inherited in a block like pattern. This finding may open up the ability to utilize such diploid regions to enhance our understanding of population genomic history, especially with respect to disease predisposition. The potential implication of findings such as paucity of ancestors and their possible effect on other parts of the genome, especially those relevant for diseases prevalent among Jews, remains an important continuing frontier for study with respect to genomic analysis of Jewish populations. These questions are particularly important for the Ashkenazi communityin which the reasons for the well-documented excess of rare recessive disorders have been repeatedly discussed without a definitive resolution. It is anticipated that future studies integrating analysis of the haploid genomic regions and other genomic regions such as the X-chromosome and the autosomes will be complementary and shed additional light of historical and population health importance. The future holds great promise in clarifying these important chapters in the history of the Jewish people.

B. Bonne-Tami, M. Korostishevsky, J. Redd, Y. Pel-O, M.E. Kaplan, M.F. Hamme, “Maternal and Paternal Lineages of the Samaritan Isolate: Mutation Rates and Time to Most Recent Common Male Ancestor,” in: Ann. Hum. Genet., 67 (2002), 153; D.M. Behar, D. Garrigan, M.E. Kaplan, Z. Mobasher, D. Rosengarten, T.M. Karafet, L. Quintana-Murci, H. Ostrer, K. Skorecki, M.F. Hammer, “Contrasting Patterns of Y Chromosome Variation in Ashkenazi and Host Non-Jewish European Populations,” in: Hum. Genet. , 114 (2004a), 354–65; D.M. Behar, M.G. Thomas, K. Skorecki, M.F. Hammer, E. Bulygina, D. Rosengarten, A.L. Jones, K. Held, V. Moses, D. Goldstein, N. Bradman, M.E. Weale, “Multiple Origins of Ashkenazi Levites: Y Chromosome Evidence for Both Near Eastern and European Ancestries,” in: American Journal of Human Genetics, 73 (2003), 768–79; D.M. Behar, E. Metspalu, T. Kivisild, A. Achilli, Y. Hadid, S. Tzur, L. Pereira, A. Amorim, L. Quintana-Murci, K. Majamaa, H. Herrnstadt, N. Howell, D. Gurwitz, B. Bonne-Tamir, A. Torroni, R. Villems, K. Skorecki, “The Matrilineal Ancestry of Ashkenazi Jewry: Portrait of a Recent Founder Event,” in: Amer. J. Hum. Genet.; S. DellaPergola, “Major Demographic Trends of World Jewry: The Last Hundred Years,” in: B. Bonne-Tamir, A. Adam (eds.), Genetic Diversity among Jews: Diseases and Markers at the DNA Level (1992), 3–32; M.F. Hammer, A.J. Redd, E.T. Wood, M.R. Bonner, H. Jarjanazi, T. Karaget, S. Santachiara-Benerecetti, A. Oppenheim, M.A. Jobling, T. Jenkins, H. Ostrer, B. Bonne-Tamir, “Jewish and Middle Eastern Non-Jewish Populations Share a Common Pool of Y-Chromosomes Biallelic Haplotypes,” in: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA , 97:6769–74; M.A. Jobling, C. Tyler-Smith, “The Human Y Chromosome: an Evolutionary Marker Comes of Age,” in: National Review of Genetics, 4:598–612; M.C. King, A.G. Motulsky, “Human Genetics. Mapping Human History,” in: Science, 298:2342–43; A. Nebel, D. Filon, B. Brinkmann, P.P. Majumder, M. Faerman, A. Oppenheim, “The Y Chromosome Pool of Jews as Part of the Genetic Landscape of the Middle East,” in: American Journal of Human Genetics, 69 (2001), 1094–1112; A. Nebel, D. Filon, M. Faerman, H. Soodyall, A. Oppenheim, “Y Chromosome Evidence for a Founder Effect in Ashkenazi Jews,” in: European Journal of Human Genetics, 13:388–91; A. Nebel, D. Filon, D.A. Weiss, M. Weale, M. Faerman, A. Oppenheim, M.G. Thomas, “High-Resolution Y Chromosome Haplotypes of Israeli and Palestinian Arabs Reveal Geographic Substructure and Substantial Overlap with Haplotypes of Jews,” in: Human Genetics, 107:603–41; M.B. Richards, V.A. Macaulay, H.J. Bandelt, B.C. Sykes, “Phylogeography of Mitochondrial DNA in Western Europe,” in: Ann. Hum. Genetics , 62, Pt. 3 (1998), 241–60; A.S. Santachiara-Benerecetti, O. Semino, G. Passarino, A. Torroni, R. Brdicka, M. Fellous, G. Modiano, “The Common Near-Eastern Origin of Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews Supported by Y-Chromosome Similarity,” in Ann. Hum. Genetics, 57, Pt. 1 (1993), 55–64; K. Skorecki, S. Selig, S. Blazer, R. Bradman, N. Bradman, P.J. Warburton, M. Ismajlowicz, M.F. Hammer, “Y Chromosomes of Jewish Priests,” in: Nature, 385 (1997), 32; M.G. Thomas, T. Parfitt, D.A. Weiss, K. Skorecki, J.F. Wilson, M. le Roux, N. Bradman, D.B. Goldstein, “Y Chromosomes Traveling South: the Cohen Modal Haplotype and the Origins of the Lemba – the ‘Black Jews of Southern Africa’,” in: American Journal of Human Genetics, 66 (2000), 674–86; M.G. Thomas, K. Skorecki, H. Ben-Ami, T. Parfitt, N. Bradman, D.B. Goldstein, “Origins of Old Testament Priests,” in: Nature, 394 (1998), 138–40; M.G. Thomas, M.E. Weale, A.L Jones, M. Richards, A. Smith, N. Redhead, A. Torroni, R. Scozzari, F. Gratrix, A. Tarekegn, J.F. Wilson, C. Capelli, N. Bradman, D.B. Goldstein, “Founding Mothers of Jewish Communities: Geographically Separated Jewish Groups Were Independently Founded by Very Few Female Ancestors,” in: American Journal of Human Genetics , 70 (2002), 1411–20. [Doron Behar and Karl Skorecki (2nd ed.)]

The abnormal genes and DNA sequences underlying most inherited genetic diseases in Jews have been identified. This progress has helped to understand the nature of these diseases, to increase the prospects for treatment, to facilitate genetic counseling, and to elucidate the population genetics underlying the segregation of these diseases in Jewish communities. Classically, genetic disorders are classified according to their mode of inheritance. Individuals inheriting one abnormal dominant gene or two abnormal recessive genes develop disease. In contrast, individuals who inherit one copy of a recessive gene do not develop disease but are carriers at risk of transmitting the disease. However, progress has revealed further complexities. Diseases formerly attributed to a single abnormal gene are often associated with different or multiple abnormal genes. There is also an imperfect correlation between inheriting an abnormal gene and the clinical features and severity of the resulting disease. Increased recognition of mild forms of classical disease has forced a reevaluation of disease prevalence in Jewish as in other populations.

Furthermore, although mutation in identifiable genes is responsible for most genetic diseases, interaction with other genes and with environmental factors often determines disease susceptibility and expression. Genetic diseases with a high prevalence in Jews are mostly recessive. In general, over 1,000 recessive diseases have been discovered. Most are rare but the prevalence of some of these diseases is increased 100-fold or more in Jewish as in other isolated ethnic groups with predominant inbreeding. This increased prevalence is usually but not invariably confined to individual Jewish ethnic groups (“edot Israel”) and not found in Jews in general. Most are severe and often lead to early death. In some diseases genetic analysis has identified the first appearance of an abnormal “founder” gene originating in a small number of individuals within a Jewish group. This creates a genetic bottleneck whereby the prevalence of a recessive genetic disease is maintained at a high level by subsequent inbreeding.

These principles and the practical issues are illustrated by examples of the most common genetic diseases. Ashkenazim are a relatively homogeneous group despite their settlement in different European countries for centuries. The high prevalence of some 20 “Ashkenazi diseases” in this group dates from founder effects and bottlenecks in the era after 75 C.E. and between 1100 and 1400 C.E. The most common of these diseases are the neurodegenerative Tay-Sachs disease and Gaucher type I disease, which has more widespread clinical features. These “lysosomal storage” diseases result from enzyme deficiencies.

Familial dysautonomia affects peripheral nerves and predominantly affects certain Ashkenazi groups. The carrier rate in Ashkenazim in Israel of Polish descent is 1 in 18 compared with 1 in 99 in those of non-Polish descent. Ashkenazi women with a family history of breast cancer are at increased risk of developing this disease, especially of early onset, due to the high (2.5%) prevalence of BRCA1 and BRCA2 gene mutations in this population. They also have a high incidence of ovarian cancer of which a large percentage, estimated at up to 41%, are attributable to “founder” mutations in these genes. Approximately 1 in 25 Ashkenazim are carriers for one of these disorders, resulting in the birth of one affected child in approximately every 3,000 Ashkenazi live births for each condition. Screening is essential at least in those with a family history. The gene mutations responsible for other less common diseases with a high prevalence in the Ashkenazi population have also been identified allowing accurate diagnosis in at risk families. Prevention programs have already reduced the number of affected children born to these families by over 90%.

In contrast, genetic analysis in cystic fibrosis is more problematical. This disorder has many clinical features in addition to the characteristic lung and pancreatic involvement. There is a high carrier rate (1 in 23) in Ashkenazi Jews but it is similar in the general northern European population. Over 900 genetic abnormalities have been associated with cystic fibrosis and there is a poor correlation between these abnormalities and disease features and severity. Sephardi Jews are genetically much more heterogeneous than Ashkenazi Jews and genetic diseases in high prevalence in Sephardi communities reflect their country of origin such as Iraq, Yemen, and Morocco. Some genetic disorders characteristic of the Mediterranean region are relatively common in all Sephardi and in non-Jewish communities, marking constant migration. Genetic screening for the abnormal hemoglobin responsible for thalassemia is well established. Familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) is an intermittent febrile illness, often difficult to diagnose. Five variants of abnormal sequence have been detected in the defective gene associated with FMF which give important insights into disease severity and its occurrence in different communities. However, genetic analysis has not solved the diagnostic problems. See also *Sickness.

Bibliography: Y. Kleiman, DNA and Tradition (2004); E. Abel, Jewish Genetic Diseases (2001). [Gideon Bach (2nd ed.)]

The traditional division of Israel into 12 tribes: Reuben, Simeon (Levi), Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, Benjamin, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Ephraim, and Manasseh. Biblical tradition holds that the 12 tribes of Israel are descended from the sons and grandsons of Jacob (Gen. 29–30; 35:16–18; 48:5–6). The tribes are collectively called Israel because of their origin in the patriarch Jacob-Israel. Jacob and his family went into Egypt as “70 souls” (Ex. 1:1–5). In Egypt “the Israelites were fertile and prolific; they multiplied and increased very greatly” (1:7), and there they became the “Israelite people” (1:9). A pharaoh, “who did not know Joseph” (1:8), oppressed them by burdensome labor. God “remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob” (2:24), made Himself known to Moses (Ex. 3), and rescued the Israelites from Egypt. By this time the nation numbered “600,000 men on foot, aside from taf ” which apparently means women as well as children (12:37). At Sinai, the nation received its laws and regulations, covenanting itself to God (Ex. 19–24). After wandering for 40 years in the desert under the leadership of Moses, the 12 Israelite tribes penetrated the land of Canaan with Joshua in command. The united force of the 12 tribes was sufficient to conquer the land, which was then distributed among them. During this period of settlement, and the subsequent period of the Judges, there was no predetermined pattern of leadership among the tribes, except for delivererjudges sent to them by God in time of need (see also *Judges, Book of). Such crises forced the tribes into cooperative action against enemies under the leadership of the “deliverer.” *Shiloh served as a sacral center for all the tribes, housing the Ark of the Covenant under the priestly family of Eli (I Sam. 1:3, 12; 2:27). Under the impact of military pressures, the Israelites felt compelled to turn to *Samuel with the request that he establish a monarchy, and *Saul was crowned to rule over all the tribes of Israel (I Sam. 11:15). Upon his death, *Ish-Bosheth, Saul's son, was accepted by all the tribes save Judah and Simeon who preferred David. David’s struggle with the house of Saul ended in victory for him, and all the elders turned to David for royal leadership. He ruled from Jerusalem over all the tribes of Israel (II Sam. 5:3), and was succeeded by his son. After the death of *Solomon, the tribes once again split along territorial and political lines, with Judah and Benjamin in the south loyal to the Davidic house, and the rest of the tribes in the north ruled by a succession of dynasties.

Modern scholarship does not generally accept the biblical notion that the 12 tribes are simply divisions of a larger unit which developed naturally from patriarchal roots. This simplistic scheme, it is felt, actually stems from later genealogical speculations which attempted to explain the history of the tribes in terms of familial relationships. The alliance of the 12 tribes is believed to have grown from the organization of independent tribes, or groups of tribes, forced together for historical reasons. Scholars differ as to when this union of 12 took place, and when the tribes of Israel became one nation. One school of thought holds that the confederation took place inside the country toward the end of the period of the Judges and the beginnings of the Monarchy.

All of the traditions which see the 12 tribes as one nation as early as the enslavement in Egypt or the wanderings in the desert are regarded as having no basis in fact. This school recognizes in the names of some of the tribes the names of ancient sites in Canaan, such as the mountains of Naphtali, Ephraim, and Judah, the desert of Judah, and Gilead. With the passage of time, those who dwelt in these areas assumed the names of the localities. M. Noth feels that the Leah tribes, Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Zebulun, and Issachar, existed at an earlier earlier stage as a confederation of six tribes whose boundaries in Canaan were contiguous. Only at a later stage did other tribes penetrate the area, eventually expanding the confederation to 12. A second school grants that the union of 12 existed during the period of wanderings in the desert, but that Canaan was not conquered by an alliance of these at any one time. Rather, there were individual incursions into the land at widely separated periods. However, the covenant among the 12 tribes and their awareness of national unity flowing from ethnic kinship and common history, faith, and sacral practices had their source in the period prior to the conquest of the land.

The number 12 is neither fictitious nor the result of an actual genealogical development in patriarchal history. It is an institutionalized and conventionalized figure which is found among other tribes as well, such as the sons of Ishmael (Gen. 25:13–16), the sons of Nahor (Gen. 22:20–24), of Joktan (Gen. 10:26–30 – so LXX), and Esau (Gen. 36:10–13). Similar organizational patterns built about groups of 12, or even six, tribes, are known from Asia Minor, Greece, and Italy. In Greece, such groupings were called amphictyony (Αμφικτυονία), from αμφικτίζω, meaning “to dwell about,” that is, about a central sanctuary. Each tribe was assigned a prearranged turn in the provision and maintenance of the shrine. The amphictyonic members would make pilgrimages to the common religious center on festive occasions. The exact measure of correspondence between the amphictyony of the Hellenic world and the duodecimal structure of the tribes of Israel may be the subject of scholarly controversy, but there can be little doubt that this pattern of 12 attributed to the Hebrew tribes is very real and historically rooted. Thus, if one tribe were to withdraw from the union or to be absorbed into another, the number 12 would be preserved, either by splitting one of the remaining tribes into two or by accepting a new tribe into the union. When, for example, the tribe of Levi is considered among the 12 tribes, the Joseph tribes are counted as one (Gen. 35:22–26; 46:8–25; 49:1–27). However, when Levi is not mentioned, the Joseph tribes are counted separately as Manasseh and Ephraim (Num. 26:4–51). For the same duodecimal considerations, Simeon is counted as a tribe even after having been absorbed into Judah (Josh. 19:1), and Manasseh, even after having split in two, is considered one. Among the six Leah tribes, Gad, although the son of Zilpah, is counted as one of them when Levi is missing (Num. 1:20–42; 26:5–50).

The confederation of the 12 tribes was primarily religious, based upon belief in the one “God of Israel” with whom the tribes had made a covenant and whom they worshiped at a common sacral center as the “people of the Lord” (Judg. 5:11; 20:2). The Tent of Meeting and the Ark of the Covenant were the most sacred cultic objects of the tribal union. Biblical tradition shows that many places served as religious centers in various periods. During the desert wanderings, “the mountain of God,” that is, Sinai, known as Horeb, served as such a place (Ex. 3:1; 18:5; cf. 5:1–3; 8:23–24), as did the great oasis at Kadesh-Barnea where the tribes remained for some time (Deut. 1:46). From there the Israelite tribes attempted a conquest of the land (Num. 13:3, 26). Many sites in Canaan are mentioned as having sacred associations or as being centers of pilgrimage. Some of these, such as Penuel, where Jacob, the nominal progenitor of the tribes, received the name Israel (Gen. 32:24–32), Beth-El (28:10–22; 35:1–15), where the Ark of the Lord rested (Judg. 20:26–28), and Beer-Sheba (Gen. 21:33; 46:1–4; Amos 5:5; 8:14) go back to patriarchal times.

Jacob built an altar at Shechem (Gen. 33:18–20) and the tribes gathered there “before the Lord” and made a covenant with Him in Joshua’s time (Josh. 24). Shiloh enjoyed special importance as a central cultic site for the tribes. There they gathered under Joshua to divide up the land by lot, and it was there that they placed the Tent of Meeting and the Ark of the Covenant (Josh. 18:1–8). Eli’s family, which traced its descent from Aaron, the high priest, served at Shiloh (I Sam. 2:27), and it was to Shiloh that the Israelites turned for festivals and sacrifices (Judg. 21:19; I Sam. 1:3; cf. Jer. 7:14; 26:9). The multiplicity of cultic places raises the question of whether all 12 tribes were, indeed, centered about one amphictyonic site. It may be that as a tribe’s connections with the amphictyony were weakened for various reasons, the tribe began to worship at one or another of the sites. Possibly, different sites served the several subgroups among the tribes. Beer-Sheba and Hebron, for example, served the southern groups of tribes (Gen. 13:18; Josh. 21:10–11; II Sam. 2:1–4; 5:1–3; 15:7–10); Shechem, Shiloh, and Gilgal (Josh. 5:9–10; I Sam. 11:14–15; 13:4–15; Amos 5:5) were revered by the tribes in the center of the country; and the shrine at Dan served the northern tribes (Judg. 18:30–31). The likelihood of a multiplicity of shrines is strengthened by the fact that clusters of Canaanite settlements separated the southern and central tribes (of the mountains of Ephraim), and divided the central tribes from those in Galilee. It is possible that various shrines served different tribes simultaneously, while the sanctuary which held the Ark of the Lord was revered as central to all 12.

The changes which occurred in the structure of the 12 tribes and in their relative strengths, find expression in the biblical genealogies. The tribes are descended from four matriarchs, eight of them from the wives Leah and Rachel, and four from the handmaids Bilhah and Zilpah (Gen. 29–30). It is a widely held view that attribution to the two wives is indicative of an early stage of tribal organization, the “tribes of Leah” and the “tribes of Rachel.” The attribution of four tribes to handmaids may indicate either a lowered status or late entry into the confederation. In the list of the 12 tribes, Reuben is prominent as the firstborn (Gen. 46:8), followed by Simeon, Levi, and Judah, the sons of Leah, who occupy primary positions. Reuben stood at the head of a tribal league and had a position of central importance among his confederates prior to the conquest of the land (Gen. 30:14; 35:22; 37:21; 42:22, 37; Num. 16:1ff.). On the other hand, the same tribe is inactive during the period of the Judges. It did not provide any of the judges, and during Deborah’s war against Sisera, Reuben “sat among the sheepfolds” and did not render any aid (Judg. 5:16). Possibly, because this tribe dwelt on the fringes of the land (I Chron. 5:9–10), its links with the others were weakened, and its continued existence as one of the tribes of Israel was in jeopardy (cf. Deut. 33:6). Simeon was absorbed by Judah. Levi spread throughout Israel as a result of its sacral duties. Judah was cut off from the rest of the tribes by a Canaanite land strip that separated the mountains of Judah and Ephraim. Reuben’s place as head of the 12 tribes was taken by the house of Joseph which played a decisive and historic role during the periods of the settlement and the Judges. Joshua came from the tribe of Ephraim (Num. 13:8). Shechem and Shiloh were within the borders of the house of Joseph (cf. Ps. 78:59, 67–68). Samuel came from the hill country of Ephraim (I Sam. 1:1). Ephraim led the tribes in the war against Benjamin over the incident of the concubine in Gibeah (Judg. 19–21). At the beginning of the Monarchy, the leadership passed to Judah (cf. Gen. 49:8ff.). The passage in I Chronicles 5:1–2 illustrates well how the dominant position among the tribes passed from Reuben to Ephraim and from Ephraim to Judah.

Each of the 12 tribes enjoyed a good deal of autonomy, ordering its own affairs after the patriarchal-tribal pattern. No doubt there were administrative institutions common to all the tribes, situated beside the central shrines, though information about them is exceedingly scanty. During the desert wanderings, leadership of the people was vested in the princes of each of the tribes and the elders who assisted Moses. They met and legislated for the entire people (Ex. 19:7; 24:1, 9; Num. 1–2; 11:16–24; 32:2; 34:16–29; Deut. 27:1; 31:28). There are references to meetings of tribal leaders and elders during the periods of the settlement and the Judges. “The princes of the congregation, the heads of the thousands of Israel” along with Phinehas the priest, conducted negotiations with the Transjordanian tribes, in the name of the entire nation (Josh. 22:30). Joshua summoned “the elders, the heads, the judges, and the officers of Israel” to make a covenant in Shechem (Josh. 24). The elders of Israel, speaking for the entire nation, requested Samuel to appoint a king (I Sam. 8:4). The incidents of the concubine in Gibeah (Judg. 19–21) and Saul’s battle with Nahash the Ammonite (I Sam. 11) are classic examples of joint action taken by the league of 12 tribes acting “as one man, from Dan even to Beer-Sheba, with the land of Gilead” (Judg. 20:1; I Sam. 11:7).

In the one case, unified action was taken by the tribes against one of their members, Benjamin, for a breach of the terms of the covenant (Judg. 20:7). The war against Nahash the Ammonite proves that the tribes were required to come to the aid of any one of the league that found itself in difficulty. Because of the sacral nature of the league, the wars of the tribes were considered “wars of the Lord” (Ex. 17:16; Num. 21:14). Nevertheless, the narratives in the Book of Judges regarding the battles which Israel waged against its enemies make it clear that the league must have been rather weak in those days. The consciousness of national and religious unity had not yet led to a solid politico-military confederation. The Song of Deborah gives clear expression to the lack of solidarity among the tribes, for some of them did not come to the aid of the Galilean tribes. It is impossible to designate even one war against external enemies during the period of the Judges in which all the tribes acted in concert. Indeed, there are indications of intertribal quarrels and disputes (Judg. 7–8; 12). In this connection, there are scholars who hold that the judge-deliverers were not pantribal national leaders, but headed only individual tribes, or groups of them (see *Judges). It was only toward the end of the period of the Judges when the Philistine pressure on the Israelite tribes increased in the west and that of the Transjordanian peoples in the east, that the religionational tribal confederation assumed political and military dimensions. The Israelite tribes then consolidated as a crystallized national-territorial entity within the framework of a monarchical regime. David, Solomon, and afterward the kings of Israel and Judah tended to weaken tribal consciousness in favor of the territorial and monarchical organization. It is apparent, however, from Ezekiel’s eschatological vision (Ezek. 47–48) that the awareness of Israel as a people composed of 12 tribes had not, even then, become effaced. See also *Ten Lost Tribes. [Bustanay Oded]

In aggadic literature the word shevatim (“tribes,” sing., shevet) applies to both the 12 sons of Jacob and to the 12 tribes descended from them. When Jacob left home and had his dream, he took 12 stones as a headrest and declared: “God has decreed that there are to be 12 tribes; yet they did not issue from Abraham or Isaac; if these 12 stones will join into one I will know that I am destined to beget them” (Gen. R. 68:11), and in fact the 12 stones coalesced into one (Gen. 28:11 being contrasted with v. 18). Whereas Abraham and Isaac both begat wicked sons, Ishmael and Esau, all of Jacob’s 12 sons were loyal to God (Shab. 146a; cf. Ex. R. 1:1). They were all named in reference to Israel’s redemption (Tanh ̣. Shemot 5), and God declared, “Their names are more precious to me than the anointing oil with which priests and kings were anointed”(Eccles. R. 7:1, 2).

All the tribal ancestors were born outside the Land of Israel, save Benjamin, and all, with the exception of Benjamin, participated in the sale of Joseph. Therefore the tribe of Benjamin was privileged to have the * Shekhinah, i.e., the Temple, in its portion (Sif. Deut. 3:5, 352). None of the tribes maintained its family purity in Egypt, and all except for Reuben, Simeon, and Levi, engaged in idolatry there (Num. R. 13:8). Just as the heavens cannot endure without the 12 constellations (Ex. R. 15:6), so the world cannot endure without the 12 tribes, for the world was created only by their merit (PR 3:10). The names of the tribes are not always enumerated in the same order, so that it should not be said that those descended from the mistresses (Rachel and Leah) took priority over the descendants of their handmaids (Bilhah and Zilpah; Ex. R. 1:6).The tribe of Zebulun engaged in trade and supported the tribe of Issachar, to enable it to devote itself to the study of the Torah; therefore in his blessings, Moses gave priority to the tribe of Zebulun (Yal. Gen. 129). All the tribes produced judges and kings, except Simeon, on account of the sin perpetrated by Zimri (Mid. Tadshe 8; see Num. 25:1–2, 14). Every tribe produced prophets; Judah and Benjamin produced kings by prophetic direction (Suk. 27b).

Whereas the tribes of Benjamin and Judah were exiled to Babylon, the Ten Tribes were exiled beyond the river *Sambatyon (Gen. R. 73:6). The Ten Tribes shall neither be resurrected nor judged; R. *Simeon b. Yoh ̣ai said, “They shall never return from exile,” but R. Akiva maintained that they would return (ARN 36:4). But see *Ten Lost Tribes. The Davidic Messiah will be descended from two tribes, his father from Judah and his mother from Dan (Yal. Gen. 160). [Harry Freedman] Bibliography: B. Luther, in: ZAW, 21 (1901), 37ff.; E. Meyer, Die Israeliten und ihre Nachbarstaemme (1906), 498ff.; W.F. Albright, in: JPOS, 5 (1925), 2–54; A. Alt, Die Landnahme der Israeliten in Palaestina (1925); idem, in: PJB, 21 (1925), 100ff.; idem, in: E. Sellin Festschrift (1927), 13–24; Alt, Kl Schr, 2 (1953), 1–65; M. Noth, Das System der Zwoelf Staemme Israels (1930), 85–108; W. Duffy, The Tribal History Theory on the Origin of the Hebrews (1944); Albright, Arch Rel, 102–9; C.V. Wolf, in: JBL, 65 (1946), 45–49; idem, in: JQR, 36 (1945–46), 287–95; Noth, Hist Isr, 53–137; Bright, Hist, 142–60; R. Smend, Yahweh War and Confederation (1970). IN THE AGGADAH: Ginzberg, Legends, 7 (1938), 481 (index), S.V. Tribes, the twelve.

The phrase Ten Lost Tribes of Israel refers to the ancient Tribes of Israel that disappeared from the Biblical account after the Kingdom of Israel was destroyed, enslaved and exiled by ancient Assyria. Many groups of Jews have doctrines concerning the continued hidden existence or future public return of these tribes. This is a subject that is partially based upon authenticated and documented historical fact, partially upon written religious tradition and partially upon speculation. There is a vast amount of literature on the Lost Tribes and no specific source can be relied upon for a complete answer.

According to the Hebrew Bible, Jacob (progenitor of Israel) had 12 sons and at least one daughter by two wives and two concubines. The twelve sons fathered the twelve Tribes of Israel.

Definition

The phrase "Ten Lost Tribes" does not appear in the Bible, leading some to questions the actual number of tribes involved. However, 1 Kings 11:31 states that the LORD will tear the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon and give ten tribes to Jeroboam:

However, it is not clear which tribes are to be counted as lost. The tribes which have been lost are those which formed the Kingdom of Israel following the dissolution of the united Kingdom of Israel in c. 930 BCE. The tribes of Reuben, Issachar, Zebulun, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Ephraim and Manasseh were parts of the kingdom, a total of nine.

It has sometimes been said that the Tribe of Simeon was a part of the northern Kingdom of Israel and was therefore part of the "Ten Lost Tribes." However, the Tribe of Simeon was never located in the Northern Kingdom, but was located entirely within the land of Judah. (Joshua 19:1)

Religious beliefs

The concept of the "Ten Lost Tribes" originally began in a religious context, based on Biblical sources, not as an ethnological idea. Some scientists have researched the topic, and at various times some have made claims of empirical evidence of the Ten Lost Tribes. However, religious and scriptural sources remain the main sources of the belief that the Ten Lost Tribes have some continuing, though hidden, identity somewhere.

There are numerous references in Biblical writings. In Ezekiel 37:16-17, the prophet is told to write on one stick (an ancient reference to scrolls) (quoted here in part) "For Judah..." and on the other (quoted here in part) , "For Joseph..." (the main Lost Tribe). The prophet is then told that these two groups shall be someday reunited.

There are also discussions in the Talmud as to whether the Ten Lost Tribes will eventually be reunited with the Tribe of Judah, that is, with the Jewish people.

Historical background

These were the nine landed tribes Zebulun, Issachar, Asher, Naphtali, Dan, Manasseh, Ephraim, Reuben and Gad, and some members of Levi who had no land allocation. The Bible makes no reference at this point to the Tribe of Simeon, and some^[who?] believe that the tribe had already disappeared due to the curse of Jacob. (Genesis 49:5-7)^{[citation
needed]}

Judah, the southern kingdom, had Jerusalem as its capital and was ruled by King Rehoboam. It was populated by the tribes of Judah and Benjamin (and also by some members of Levi and by the remnants of Simeon).

In 722 BCE the Assyrians under Shalmaneser V and then under Sargon II conquered the northern Kingdom of Israel, destroyed its capital Samaria and sent the Israelites into exile and captivity in Khorason^{[citation
needed]}, now part of eastern Iran and western Afghanistan. The Ten Lost Tribes are those Israelites who were deported by the Assyrians. In Jewish popular culture, the ten tribes disappeared from history, leaving only the tribes of Benjamin and Judah to become the ancestors of modern day Jews.

In 597 BCE the nation of Judah was conquered by Babylon, and in 587 began the forced Judean exile. About 50 years later, in 537 BCE, the Persians (who had conquered Babylon in 539 BCE) allowed Jews to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the Temple. It is speculated, however, that by the end of this era, members of the tribes seem to have abandoned their individual identities in favor of a common one.^{[citation
needed]}

Some evidence of continuing identity of Jewish individuals in later centuries can be seen from the Gospels, where an individual is identified with the tribe of Asher. Thus, some descendants of the twelve tribes must have returned in the centuries following the Babylonian captivity.

17th- to mid-20th-century theories
Since at least the 17th century both Jews and Christians have proposed theories concerning the Lost Tribes, based to varying degrees on Biblical accounts. An Ashkenazi Jewish tradition speaks of these tribes as Die Roite Yiddelech, "The little red Jews", cut off from the rest of Jewry by the legendary river Sambation "whose foaming waters raise high up into the sky a wall of fire and smoke that is impossible to pass through".[2]

The Portuguese traveller Antonio de Montezinos brought back reports that some of the Lost Tribes were living among the Native Americans of the Andes in South America. In response to this, Manasseh ben Israel, a noted rabbi of Amsterdam, wrote on December 23, 1649:

... I think that the Ten Tribes live not only there ... but also in other lands scattered everywhere; these never did come back to the Second Temple and they keep till this day still the Jewish Religion ...
—[3]
In 1655, Manasseh ben Israel petitioned Oliver Cromwell to allow the Jews to return to England. (Since the Edict of Expulsion in 1290, Jews had been prohibited by law from living in England.) One of the reasons for Cromwell's alleged interest in the return of the Jews to England was the abundance at the time of theories relating to the end of the world. Many of these ideas were fixed upon the year 1666 and the Fifth Monarchy Men who were looking for the return of Jesus as the Messiah who would establish a final kingdom to rule the physical world for a thousand years. They supported Cromwell's Republic in the expectation that it was a preparation for the fifth monarchy - that is, the monarchy which should succeed the Assyrian, the Persian, the Greek, and Roman world empires.

Mixed in with all of this was a background of general belief that the Lost Ten Tribes did not represent ethnic Jews who partially formed the ancient Kingdom of Judah, but tribes who maintained a separate capital at Samaria. Some have attempted to dismiss this complicated saga by stating that it is nothing but Supersessionism. However, the ideas behind these various competing theories are far more complicated, especially when Sabbatai Zevi, the "messiah" claimant and his supporters postulated that he represented groups in addition to those identified as being Jews. However, Zevi lost his credibility to all but the Donmeh when he converted to Islam and became an apostate to Judaism in 1666.

During the latter half of the 18th century, variations on this same theory were advocated by some who believed that the British Empire of nations was a manifestation of ancient prophecies recorded in the Book of Genesis predating both the Kingdom of Israel and the Kingdom of Judah.

Others believe that the Lost Tribes simply merged with the local population. For instance, the New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia states "In historic fact, some members of the Ten Tribes remained in Palestine, where apart from the Samaritans some of their descendants long preserved their identity among the Jewish population, others were assimilated, while others were presumably absorbed by the last Judean exiles who in 597-586 [B.C.E.] were deported to Assyria...Unlike the Judeans of the southern Kingdom, who survived a similar fate 135 years later, they soon assimilated..." [4]. Part of this article and a similar article can be read online at Roads to Dystopia

Groups claiming descent from specific Lost Tribes
Many groups claim descent from specific Lost Tribes but preliminary scientific evidence such as Y-DNA testing, specifically Haplogroup J, would exclude many of them[citation needed]. Some of these groups include:

Bene Ephraim (from southern India) claim descent from the Tribe of Ephraim
The Nasranis of Kerala, India are of Hebrew or Israelite heritage but not much is known of their past, making it difficult to be certain that they are also descended from the 'Lost Tribes'. (Ref. Dr. Asahel Grant's 'The Nestorians or the Lost Tribes of Israel' for more about the Nazarenes and Nestorians).

Bene Israel of South Asia
The Bene Israel (Hebrew: "Sons of Israel") are a group of Jews who live in various Indian cities, Mumbai, Pune, Ahmadabad, and in Pakistan such as in Karachi, Peshawer and Multan. Prior to their waves of emigration to Israel and still to this day, the Bene Israel form the largest sector of the subcontinent's Jewish population, and constitute the bulk of those sometimes referred to as Pakistani Jews. The native language of the Bene Israel is Judæo-Marathi, a form of Marathi. Most Bene Israel have now emigrated to Israel. Some researchers believe that the Bene Israel are descended from the Ten Tribes.[5]

Bnei Menashe of India
Main article: Bnei Menashe
The Bnei Menashe (from northeast India) claim descent from the lost Tribe of Manasseh. Their oral traditions depict them as originally going from the Persian Empire into Afghanistan. (They may have been in the Persian Empire because it occupied the lands of Assyria when it conquered Babylonia.) According to their traditions, they then went to China, where they encountered persecution, then pressed on to India and Southern Asia.[6]

Beta Israel of Ethiopia
Main article: Beta Israel
The Beta Israel (also known as Falashas) are Ethiopian Jews. Some members of the Beta Israel as well as several Jewish scholars believe that they are descended from the lost Tribe of Dan, as opposed to the traditional story of their descent from the Queen of Sheba.

Bukharian Jews of Central Asia
Main article: Bukharian Jews
Bukharian Jews claim ancestry from the Tribe of Naphtali and the Tribe of Issachar.[citation needed] It has been suggested that the Bukharian Jews are related to the Tribe of Issachar because a common surname among them is Issacharoff.[7]

Persian Jews
Main article: Persian Jews
Persian Jews claim descent from the Tribe of Ephraim. Persian Jews (also called Iranian Jews) are members of Jewish communities living in Iran and throughout the former greatest extent of the Persian Empire.

Igbo Jews of Africa
Main article: Igbo Jews
The Igbo Jews of Nigeria claim descent variously from the tribes of Ephraim, Naphtali, Menasseh, Levi, Zebulun and Gad.

Samaritans
All Samaritans, in one form or another, see themselves as descendants of the original Hebrews. The Samaritan community in Israel and the Palestinian territories numbers about 600. These people, who still struggle to keep their ancient traditions, live in what was the capital of Samaria - Nablus and the town of Holon. They claim to be authentic descendants of the Israelite tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh who were not exiled.

Groups claiming descent from a non-specific Lost Tribe
Some groups believe that they are descended from one of the Lost Tribes, but don't know which one. These include:

The House of Israel in Ghana claims to be one of the Lost Tribes of Israel.
Pashtun people, ethnic Afghans traditionally claim descent from the Lost Tribes.
Qiang people (from northwestern China) claim to be descendants of Abraham.
British Israelism (sometimes called Anglo-Israelism) claims that the British are the direct lineal descendants of the Lost Tribes of Israel.
The Makuya sect of Japan believes that parallels between ancient Japanese culture and Biblical practice indicate a Lost Tribes origin for many aspects of Japanese religion and culture.
Lemba people of Africa
Main article: Lemba
The Lemba people (Vhalemba) from Southern Africa claim to be descendants of a lost tribe which fled from what is now Yemen and journeyed south.[8][9][10] DNA testing has genetically linked the Lemba with modern Jews.[11][12] They have specific religious practices similar to those in Judaism and a tradition of being a migrant people with clues pointing to an origin in West Asia or North Africa. According to the oral history of the Lemba, their ancestors were Jews who came from a place called Sena several hundred years ago and settled in East Africa. Some research suggests that "Sena" may refer to Wadi Masilah (near Sayhut) in Yemen, often called Sena, or alternatively to the city of Sanaa, also located in Yemen.[11]

Pashtuns of the Afghan region
Main article: Theory of Pashtun descent from Israelites
The Pashtuns are a predominantly Muslim people, native to Afghanistan and Pakistan, who adhere to their pre-Islamic indigenous religious code of honour and culture Pashtunwali. They traditionally claim descent from the Lost Tribes. The Yousafzai (Yusafzai) are a large group of Pashtun tribes. Their name means "Sons of Joseph".[13] There are also similar names in other areas of the region, such as the disputed land of Kashmir. There are a variety of cultural and ethnic similarities between Jews and Pashtuns.[14][15] A visit by a Western journalist in 2007 revealed that many currently active Pashtun traditions may have parallels with Jewish traditions.[16] The code of Pashtunwali is strikingly similar in content and subject matter to the Mosaic law.

A book which corresponds to Pashtun historical records, Taaqati-Nasiri, states that in the 7th century a people called the Bani Israel settled in Ghor, southeast of Herat, Afghanistan, and then migrated south and east. These Bani Israel references are in line with the commonly held view by Pashtuns that when the twelve tribes of Israel were dispersed, the tribe of Joseph, among other Hebrew tribes, settled in the region.[17] Hence the tribal name 'Yusef Zai' in Pashto translates to the 'sons of Joseph'. This is also described extensively in great detail by Makhzan-i-Afghani, a historical work from the 17th Century by Nehamtullah, an official in the royal court of Mughal Emperor Jehangir. A similar story is told by Iranian historian Ferishta.[18]

This account is also substantiated by the fact that the Bnei Menashe of India also have traditions which trace their wanderings as going originally from the Persian Empire to Afghanistan. In their case, they then went to China, where they encountered persecution, then pressed on to India and Southern Asia.[6]

Origin theories
Main article: Makhzan-i-Afghani
The Bani-Israelite theory about the origin of the Pashtun is based on Pashtun traditions; the tradition itself is documented in a source titled Makhzan-i-Afghani, the only written source addressing Pashtun origins. It was written in 1612, by Nematullah Harvi, a scribe at the court of Mughal Emperor Jehangir of Hindustan. Nematullah compiled his book on the order of Khan Jehan Lodhi of the Lodhi dynasty, a Pashtun noble and a courtier of the Emperor Jehangir.[19]

Some sources state that the Makhzan-i-Afghani has been discredited by historical and linguistic inconsistencies. The oral tradition is believed to be a myth that grew out of a political and cultural struggle between Pashtuns and the Mughals, which explains the historical backdrop for the creation of the myth, the inconsistencies of the mythology, and the linguistic research that refutes any Semitic origins.[19] There are also other sources which disagree strongly with the hypothesis that the Pashtuns have Israelite origins.[20]

Chiang Min people of China
Main article: Chiang Min people
The Chiang Min people of northwest China claim to be descendents of Abraham. Tradition holds that their forefather had 12 descendents.

Kaifeng Jews
Main article: Kaifeng Jews
According to historical records, a Jewish community with a synagogue built in 1163 existed at Kaifeng from at least the Southern Song Dynasty until the late nineteenth century. A stone monument in the city suggests that they were there since at least 231 BC.

Bedul, Petra
At the beginning of the 20th century, the Bedouin tribe of “Bedul”, living in the caves of Petra, Jordan, captured the imagination of Zionist pioneers. Among them was the historian, explorer and second president of Israel, Yitzhak Ben-Zvi. Ben Zvi discovered traces of ancient Hebrew customs in the lifestyles of some Palestinian villagers and Bedouin tribes. He speculated that the inhabitants on both sides of the Jordan river may be descendants of the original Hebrew population which never left the area, despite the numerous exiles. Although 100 years ago they presented themselves to British historians as the “Sons of Israel”, the Bedul of today deny the legend concerning their Hebrew origin and claim that they are descendants of the Nabateans who built Petra.[citation needed]

Speculation regarding other ethnic groups
Scythian / Cimmerian Theories
Several theories claim that the Scythians and/or Cimmerians were in whole or in part the Lost Tribes of Israel. The theories are generally based on the belief that the Northern Kingdom of Israel, which had been deported by the Assyrians, became known in history as the Scythians and/or Cimmerians. Various points of view exist as to which modern nations these people became.

The Behistun Inscription is often cited as a link between the deported Israelites, the Cimmerians and the Scythians (Saka).

George Rawlinson wrote:

We have reasonable grounds for regarding the Gimirri, or Cimmerians, who first appeared on the confines of Assyria and Media in the seventh century B.C., and the Sacae of the Behistun Rock, nearly two centuries later, as identical with the Beth-Khumree of Samaria, or the Ten Tribes of the House of Israel.
—[21]
Adherents often believe that the Behistun Inscription connects the people known in Old Persian and Elamite as Saka, Sacae or Scythian with the people known in Babylonian as Gimirri or Cimmerian.

It should be made clear from the start that the terms 'Cimmerian' and 'Scythian' were interchangeable: in Akkadian the name Iskuzai (Asguzai) occurs only exceptionally. Gimirrai (Gamir) was the normal designation for 'Cimmerians' as well as 'Scythians' in Akkadian.
—[22]
The archeologist and British Israelite, E. Raymond Capt, claimed similarities between King Jehu's pointed headdress and that of the captive Saka king seen to the far right on the Behistun Inscription.[23]

He also posited that the Assyrian word for the House of Israel, "Khumri", which was named after Israel's King Omri of the 8th century BCE, is phonetically similar to "Gimirri"[23] (Cimmerian).

Critics of the Israel / Scythian theory argue that the customs of the Scythians and Cimmerians contrast those of the Ancient Israelites[24][25] and that the similarities and theories proposed by adherents stand in contradiction to the greater body of research on the history of ancient populations, which does not provide support for the purported links between these ancient populations.[26]

British Israelism variant
Main article: British Israelism
British Israelism (also known as 'Anglo-Israelism') is the theory that people of Western European descent, especially Britain and the United States, are descended from the 'Lost Tribes' of Israel. Adherents believe that the deported Israelites became Scythians / Cimmerians who are then alleged to have become the Celts / Anglo-Saxons of Western Europe.[27] The theory arose in England, from where it spread to the United States.[28] During the 20th Century, British Israelism was aggressively promoted by Herbert W. Armstrong, founder of the Worldwide Church of God.[29] Armstrong believed that this theory provided a 'key' to understanding biblical prophecy, and that he was specially called by God to proclaim these prophecies to the 'lost tribes' of Israel before the coming of the 'end-times'[30]. The Worldwide Church of God no longer teaches the theory[31], but some offshoot churches such as the Philadelphia Church of God and the United Church of God continue to teach it even though British Israelism is inconsistent with the findings of modern genetics.

Brit-Am variant
Brit-Am, sometimes confused with British Israelism, is an organization centered in Jerusalem, and composed of Jews and non-Jews. Brit-Am, like British Israel, identifies the Lost Ten Tribes with peoples of West European descent, but does so from a Jewish perspective quoting both Biblical and Rabbinical sources. The evidence that Brit-Am relies upon is Biblical in the light of Rabbinical Commentary but is supplemented by secular theories which posit the Lost Tribes / Scythian / Cimmerian connection which they then believe to have become various Western European nations.[32] An example of Brit-Am scholarship may be seen from its treatment of Obadiah 1:20[33] where the original Hebrew as understood by Rabbinical Commentators such as Rashi and Abarbanel is referring to the Lost Ten Tribes in France and England.[34] Brit-Am also believes that "Other Israelite Tribes gave rise to elements within Finland, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Ireland, Wales, France, Holland, and Belgium" and that "The Tribe of Dan is to be found amongst part of the Danish, Irish, and Welsh." Brit-Am also believes that the Khazars were descended from the Ten Tribes and quotes Jewish and non-Jewish sources that were contemporaneous with them.[35]

Other variants
Other organizations teach other variants of the theory, such as that the Scythians / Cimmerians consisted in whole or in part the Lost Ten Tribes. One such theory posits that the lost Israelites can be defined by the Y-DNA haplogroup R, which consists of much of Europe and Russia,[36] which is in contrast to British Israelism and Brit-Am which believe that the Israelites became only Western Europeans. It should be noted that the genetic findings postulated by this and other theories are typically inconsistent with the findings of generally accepted research in archeology, anthropology and population genetics.

Kurds
Main article: Genetic origins of the Kurds
Some have promoted the notion that the Kurds represent a Lost Tribe. Some claims have been made regarding a genetic relationship between the Kurds and the Jews on the basis of a similarity between Kurdish Y-DNA and a Y haplotype that is associated with the Jewish priesthood. However, in genetic testing of the Y chromosome of 95 Muslim Kurds, only one sample (1.05% of the Kurds tested) matched the so-called Cohen Modal Haplotype (CMH), consisting of six specific Y-STR values.[37]

Various misleading statements have associated typical Kurdish Y-DNA with that of the Jews. However, these attempts are based on several sources of confusion:

The Cohen Modal Haplotype in its original form includes only six Y-STR markers, which with the scientific advances since that time, are now understood to be far too few to adequately identify a unique, closely related group that shares common descent from one relatively recent paternal ancestor. The same six marker values can be found by random mutations in other populations that are only remotely related. They are thus identical by state, but not Identical by descent. The 6-marker CMH cannot be used as a clear indicator of Cohen genetic ancestry, without additional data. Thus its presence should not be used as grounds for probable Jewish ancestry in a population.
It is touted as a fact of great significance that the most common (modal) 6-marker haplotype of the Kurds is only one step from the CMH, but in fact, these same six marker values that were found to be the "Kurdish modal haplotype" can be seen in the data, in numerous sources, to be the most common haplotype amongst a wide variety of J2 Y chromosomes, wherever they may be found, in ethnic groups of the Middle East or in Europe[38][39] -- thus, it is hardly an indication of a close relationship with the Cohanim priesthood, or with the Jews.
The fact that the 2001 paper by Nebel found a somewhat greater similarity between the Y-DNA of the Kurds and the Jews than between the Jews and the Palestinians does not point to a uniquely close relationship between the Jews and the Kurds. This study did not compare Jews with other non-Kurdish Iraqis, or with the people of Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, or other nearby lands. The available data indicates that these peoples are all closely related, with the Jews and Kurds making up just two per cent of a diverse family of Middle Eastern peoples in this region.
Japanese
See also: History of the Jews in Japan
Some writers have speculated that the Japanese people themselves may be direct descendants of part of the Ten Lost Tribes. There are some parallels between Japanese and Israelite rituals, culture, traditions, and language, which provide some evidence for this possibility.[40][41] An article that has been widely circulated and published, entitled "Mystery of the Ten Lost Tribes: Japan" by Arimasa Kubo[42] (a Japanese writer living in Japan who studied the Hebrew Bible), concludes that many traditional customs and ceremonies in Japan are very similar to the ones of ancient Israel and that perhaps these rituals came from the religion and customs of the Jews and the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel who might have come to ancient Japan.

Joseph Eidelberg's "The Biblical Hebrew Origin of the Japanese People" makes a similar case:

Late in his life, Joseph Eidelberg began analyzing ancient traditions, religious ceremonies, historical names, haiku poems, Kana writings and Japanese folk songs, discovering thousands of words with similar pronunciations, sounds and translations between Hebrew and Japanese. These discoveries are history in the making, giving credible new information on the meanings of many unknown Japanese words, numbers, songs and cultural traditions – and this book is the first time that these remarkable similarities are combined into a single consistent theory.
—[43]
Irish
There is a theory that the Irish, or that Insular Celts as a whole, are descended from the Ten Lost Tribes. Proponents of this theory state that there is evidence that the prophet Jeremiah came to Ireland with Princess Tea Tephi, a member of the Israelite royal family.[44] Proponents of this theory point to various parallels between Irish and ancient Hebrew culture. For example, they note that the harp, the symbol of Ireland, also plays a role in Jewish history, as the musical instrument of King David. Some maintain that the Tribe of Dan conducted sea voyages to Ireland and colonized it as early as the period of the Judges under the name Tuatha Dé Danann.

Aspects of this theory are also sometimes cited by adherents of British Israelism, as one possible explanation of how the Ten Lost Tribes might have reached the British Isles. However, British Israelism takes many forms, and does not always use this hypothesis as its main narrative.[45][46]

Native Americans
Several explorers, especially during the 17th and 18th centuries, claimed to have collected evidence that some of the Native American tribes might be descended from the Ten Lost Tribes. Several recent books and articles have focused on these theories.[47][48][49]

The belief that some Native Americans were a Lost tribe of Israel goes back centuries and includes individuals like the 1782 President of the Continental Congress Elias Boudinot[50][51] and Mordecai Noah, the most influential Jew in the United States in the early 19th Century.[52][53]

The Book of Mormon, one of the religious texts of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), claims that early residents of the Americas included descendents from the tribe of Joseph, and particularly through Manasseh.

Some sources such as Howshua Amariel and various researchers assert that there is DNA evidence, linguistic research and other research which indicates links between the Cherokee Nation and the Jewish people.[54][55][56][57]

General dispersions, via Media region
This theory begins with the notion that the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh are the sons of Joseph, who had been in captivity (Genesis 37 through 45) and bore them with the daughter of the Pharaoh's Priest, Asenath (Genesis 41:45-52). The Tribe of Levi was set apart to serve in the Holy Temple (Numbers 1:47-54 2:33 3:6-7). The arrangement of the Tribes was given in Numbers 2.

It is now believed by many that the exiled tribes, who were, according to the Second Book of Kings, transported to the region of Media in what is now northwestern Iran, most likely assimilated into the population of the area, losing any special sense of Israelite identity. There is also Biblical and Talmudic testimony that much of the population of the "lost" tribes was simply reunited with the rest of the Israelites when they, too, were exiled and, later, returned to the Land of Israel. However, many over the years, in order to hide their Jewish or Israelite identities during tribulations, crusades and continual exiles, have scattered around the whole earth and are believed to have assimilated into the much larger non-Jewish population.

There is now genetic testing being done to representatives of at least two groups - the Lemba in Africa and the Bnei Menashe in India - in attempts to verify claims of descent from the "lost ten tribes". So far, there is nothing conclusive, though in the case of the Lemba, there is a definite link[58] to Levite Hebrew ancestry, specifically Kohen.

Nathan Ausubel's list
Nathan Ausubel wrote:

There are quite a number of peoples today who cling to the ancient tradition that they are descended from the Jewish Lost Tribes: the tribesmen of Afghanistan, the Mohammedan Berbers of West Africa, and the six million Christian Igbo people of Nigeria. Unquestionably, they all practice certain ancient Hebraic customs and beliefs, which lends some credibility to their fantastic-sounding claims.
—[59]
In his 1953 work Pictorial History of the Jewish People, Nathan Ausubel compiled the following list of peoples connected in one way or another to this legend:

Baghdad
Iran
Kurdistan
Yemen
Georgia
Bokhara
Hadhramaut
Mountain Jews
Afghanistan
Bene-Israel
Cochin Jews
China
Egypt
Algeria
Morocco
Libya
Tunisia
Djerba
The Sahara
Cave Dwellers = Atlas Mountains south of Tripolitania and Tunisia. Closely related to the Jews of the Sahara, they believe that their ancestors were brought as captives from Judea by Titus after 70 AD. They cut out tiny paper boats which decorate their synagogues where they pray: May a boat soon come and carry us to Jerusalem.
The Falashas = Lake Tana, Ethiopia. Claim to have come with the Queen of Sheba to visit King Solomon.
The Samaritans = Nablus (Shechem). Claim to be from the tribes of Ephraim, Menashe, and Levi, and built a rival Temple on Mount Gerizim in the days of Ezra.
Karaites
Other religions
Latter-day Saints
Main article: Mormon view of the House of Joseph
Latter-day Saints believe in the literal gathering of Israel, and the LDS Church is actively gathering people from around the world into the Twelve tribes.

See also
Schisms among the Jews describes some of the early background to the split between the kingdoms of Israel and Judah
Shavei Israel is an organization which seeks to find "lost Jews"
Assyria destroyed the Kingdom of Israel and caused the Ten Tribes "to become lost"
Babylonia and Assyria were the global powers confronting the Israelites in ancient times
Babylonian captivity (inflicted by Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon)
Jewish diaspora
Timeline of Jewish history
History of the Jews in China
History of the Jews in India
Abrahamic religions - deals with Judaism, Christianity and Islam and a few other faiths
Richard Reader Harris wrote The Lost Tribes of Israel in 1908 and was a major promoter of British Israelism, the belief that people of Western European descent are also the direct lineal descendants of the Lost Ten Tribes
Joseph Wolff - the so-called "Eccentric Missionary", the son of a rabbi who converted to Christianity, who in 1828 set off on extensive travels through Asia in search of the Ten Tribes
United States in Prophecy
Assyria and Germany in Anglo-Israelism
[show]v • d • eThe Biblical and Historical Israelites

Children of Israel / Twelve Tribes of Israel · Ten Lost Tribes

History of ancient Israel and Judah · Land of Israel ·
United Monarchy (Kingdom of Israel) · Northern Kingdom · Southern Kingdom (Kingdom of Judah)

Tanakh · Bible · Hebrew Bible · Old Testament · The Bible and history

References and notes

Footnotes

^ Lost Tribes of Israel program on NOVA, Original broadcast date: 02/22/2000
^ Moses Rosen. "The Recipe" (published as epilogue to The Face of Survival, 1987).
^ Moses Rosen. "The Recipe" (published as epilogue to The Face of Survival, 1987). Nathan Ausubel. Pictorial History of the Jewish People, Crown, 1953.
^ The Lost Tribes of Israel as a Problem in History and Sociology, Stanford M Lyman, International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society, Volume 12, Number 1 / September, 1998
^ The Bene Israel of India, Dr. Shalva Weil, bh.org.il.
^ ^a ^b Bnei Menashe.com History page, A Long-Lost Tribe is Ready to Come Home, by Stephen Epstein, 1997, accessed 4/23/07.
^ Ehrlich, M. Avrum Encyclopedia of the Jewish Diaspora: Origins, Experiences, and Culture ABL-CIO October 2008 ISBN:9781851098736 p.84 [1]
^ Transcript, INSIDE AFRICA: Current Events on the African Continent, CNN, September 11, 2004.
^ The Lemba, The Black Jews of Southern Africa, NOVA episode, PBS.
^ The Story of the Lemba People by Dr. Rudo Mathivha, 15th October 1999.
^ ^a ^b Tudor Parfitt's Remarkable Journey Part 2, NOVA, PBS website.
^ Lemba of South African Jews, - San Diego Jewish Journal March 2004.
^ Mystery of the Ten Lost Tribes - Afghanistan, by Rabbi Marvin Tokayer, moshiach.com website
^ The Israeli Source of the Pathan Tribes, from the book, Lost Tribes from Assyria, by A Avihail and A Brin, 1978, in Hebrew by Issachar Katzir, at dangoor.com, website of The Scribe Magazine.
^ Tribal groups, NOVA episode, PBS.
^ Is One of the Lost Tribes the Taliban?, by Ilene Prusher, Moment Magazine, April 2007.
^ Afghanistan, The Virtual Jewish History Tour (retrieved 10 January 2007).
^ Introduction: Muhammad Qāsim Hindū Šāh Astarābādī Firištah, History Of The Mohamedan Power In India, The Packard Humanities Institute Persian Texts in Translation (retrieved 10 January 2007).
^ ^a ^b Bani-Israelite Theory of Paktoons Ethnic Origin Afghanology.com (retrieved 10 January 2007).
^ Afghanistan and Israel, britam.org
^ George Rawlinson, noted in his translation of History of Herodotus, Book VII, p. 378
^ Maurits Nanning Van Loon. "Urartian Art. Its Distinctive Traits in the Light of New Excavations", Istanbul, 1966. p. 16
^ ^a ^b E. Raymond Capt, Missing Links Discovered in Assyrian Tablets Artisan Pub, 1985 ISBN 0-934666-15-6
^ (Greer, 2004. p57-60)Greer, Nick (2004). The British-Israel Myth. pp. 55.
^ Dimont, C (1933). The Legend of British-Israel. http://www.theologicalstudies.org.uk/article_legend_dimont.html.
^ (Greer, 2004. p57-60)Greer, Nick (2004). The British-Israel Myth. pp. 62.
^ "The United States and Britain in Bible Prophecy". http://www.ucg.org/booklets/US/archaelogical.htm. Retrieved 2009-01-14.
^ Parfitt, T: The Lost Tribes of Israel: The history of a myth., page 52-65. Phoenix, 2003.
^ Parfitt, T: "The Lost Tribes of Israel: The history of a myth.", page 57. Phoenix, 2003.
^ [2] Orr, R: "How Anglo-Israelism Entered Seventh-day Churches of God: A history of the doctrine from John Wilson to Joseph W.Tkach."
^ [3] "Transformed by Christ: A Brief History of the Worldwide Church of God"
^ Davidiy, Yair (1996). "The Cimmerians, Scythians, and Israel". http://www.britam.org/cimmerians-scythians.html. Retrieved 2009-02-04.
^ Brit-Am Commentary to by Yair Davidiy, britam website, accessed 10/3/08.
^ Biblical Locations of the Lost Ten Tribes: Scriptural Proof, by Yair Davidiy, britam website, accessed 7/15/08.
^ The Khazars and the Scottish, by Yair Davidiy, britam website, accessed 10/3/08.
^ Hanok. "Israelite and Noahic Haplogroup Hypotheses". http://jewsandjoes.com/israelite-and-noahic-haplogroup-hypotheses.html. Retrieved 2009-02-04.
^ Almut Nebel et al., The Y Chromosome Pool of Jews as Part of the Genetic Landscape of the Middle East, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 69:1095–1112, 2001
^ Cinnioglu et al., Excavating Y-chromosome haplotype strata in Anatolia, Hum Genet (2004) 114 : 127–148
^ Di Giacomo et al., Y chromosomal haplogroup J as a signature of the post-neolithic colonization of Europe, Hum Genet (2004) 115: 357–371
^ Israelites Came To Ancient Japan, moshiach.com, Chabad website, accessed 3/23/07.
^ Japan article, Nova episode: Lost tribes of Israel, PBS website.
^ Israelites Came To Ancient Japan , Arimasa Kubo.
^ isralbooks.com listing
^ Judah's Sceptre and Joseph's Birthright by J.H. Allen (the Lost Ten Tribes of Israel)
^ Lost Tribes article at BritAm.org
^ United States and Britain in Prophecy article at Trumpet Magazine website
^ Nova Episode: The Ten Lost Tribes, PBS.
^ The Myth of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel, at bh.org.il
^ UNC Press web page for book Sacred Tongue: Hebrew and the American Imagination by Shalom L. Goldman 2004 by the University of North Carolina Press.
^ Elias Boudinot (1816, 2003). "Star in the West Or a Humble Attempt to Discover the Long Lost Ten Tribes of Israel Preparatory to Their Return to Their Beloved City, Jerusalem". Kessinger Publishing. http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&id=0HAIX0fkMSoC&dq=Elias+Boudinot+Israel&printsec=frontcover&source=web&ots=Ss0QDUYN3T&sig=ONA1byYKcz2ynjgOoFQkF7IkdAI&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=5&ct=result. Retrieved 2008-09-15.
^ Amariel, Yeshiyah, Howshua. "Amariel Family Oral History". Amariel Family Publishing. http://amarielfamily.com/7.htm. Retrieved 2008-09-03. "Boudinot seems to have felt that the popular identification of the Indians as the lost Israelites would bring with it a widespread realization that the Bible and its prophecies were true"
^ Mordecai Manuel Noah. "DISCOURSE ON THE EVIDENCES OF THE AMERICAN INDIANS BEING THE DESCENDANTS OF THE LOST TRIBES OF ISRAEL". Oliver’s Bookshelf. http://olivercowdery.com/texts/noah1837.htm. Retrieved 2008-09-03.
^ "Mordecai Manuel Noah". Jewish Virtual Library. http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/MNoah.html. Retrieved 2008-09-03. "Mordecai Manuel Noah was the most influential Jew in the United States in the early 19th Century."
^ Cohen, Aaron (2006-09-11). "Unique Translation of the Paleo-Hebrew Tanach". http://www.articlesbase.com/religion-articles/unique-translation-of-the-paleohebrew-tanach-558436.html. Retrieved 2008-09-15. "'For over 20 years I have used my knowledge of the ancient Hebrew language to identify the history of my people written in stone across the globe;' said Amariel, a Hispanic (Cherokee) Indian who is descended from a tribe that has been mentioned for centuries in the Americas by European historians (both Jews and non-Jews) as a potential lost tribe of Israel"
^ Frenkel, Sheera Clair (2005-02-16). "A headdress of many colors. Would-be Black Hebrew traces 'Jewish heritage' via Cherokee roots". The Jerusalem Post: p. 05. http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/jpost/access/793889351.html?dids=793889351:793889351&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:FT&date=Feb+16%2C+2005&author=SHEERA+CLAIRE+FRENKEL&pub=Jerusalem+Post&edition=&startpage=05&desc=A+headdress+of+many+colors.+Would-be+Black+Hebrew+traces+%27Jewish+heritage%27+via+Cherokee+roots. Retrieved 2008-09-08. "[Amariel] translates ancient Hebrew into English"
^ Amariel, Yeshiyah, Howshua. "Amariel Family Oral History". Amariel Family Publishing. p. 7. http://amarielfamily.com/1.htm. Retrieved 2008-09-03. "returning a pure language unto our people (Zep: 3:9) for the purpose to demonstrate that we are the ancient ones (children of Israel)."
^ Belman, Ted (2008-08-02). "Missouri Cherokee Tribes proclaim Jewish Heritage". http://www.israpundit.com/2008/?p=1700. Retrieved 2008-09-03.
^ www.aish.com
^ cited on p. 217, Pictorial History of the Jewish People by Nathan Ausubel, Crown, 1953)

Notations

External links

‍Brautbar C [55] ‍‍‍Friedman E [53] ‍‍‍Gazit E [46] ‍‍‍Seligsohn U [43] ‍‍‍Modan B [38] ‍‍‍Cohen T [38] ‍‍‍Friedlander Y [36] ‍‍‍Shohat M [36] ‍‍‍Kahana E [36] ‍‍‍Zlotogora J [35] ‍‍‍Zimran A [34] ‍‍‍Offit K [34] ‍‍‍Foulkes W [32] ‍‍‍Goldman B [32] ‍‍‍Beutler E [30] ‍‍‍Abeliovich D [30] ‍‍‍Narod S [30] ‍‍‍Pras M [29] ‍‍‍Korczyn A [28] ‍‍‍Gershoni-Baruch R [28] ‍‍‍Bach G [26] ‍‍‍Ozelius L [26] ‍‍‍Pras E [25] ‍‍‍Alter M [25] ‍‍‍Bressman S [24] ‍‍ ‍‍Rotter J [24] ‍‍‍Desnick R [24] ‍‍‍Szeinberg A [24] ‍‍‍Kobyliansky E [23] ‍‍‍Laron Z [23] ‍‍‍Struewing J [23] ‍‍‍Rennert G [23] ‍‍‍Kark J [22] ‍‍‍Navon R [22] ‍‍‍Ramot B [22] ‍‍‍Elstein D [22] ‍‍‍Dagan R [21] ‍‍‍Chetrit A [21] ‍‍‍Menczer J [21] ‍‍‍Modan M [21] ‍‍‍Bonné-Tamir B [21] ‍‍‍Peretz H [20] ‍‍‍Levav I [20] ‍‍‍De Leon D [20] ‍‍‍‍Fahn S [19] ‍‍‍Gilat T [19] ‍‍‍Risch N [19] ‍‍‍Ellis N [19] ‍‍‍Livneh A [19] ‍‍ ‍‍Epstein L [18] ‍‍‍Slater P [18] ‍‍‍Peretz T [18] ‍‍‍Kastner D [18] ‍‍‍Shohat T [18] ‍‍‍Meiner Z [18] ‍‍‍Brin M [18] ‍‍‍Iscovich J [18] ‍‍‍Rozen P [18] ‍‍‍Levy-Lahad E [18] ‍‍‍Harlap S [17] ‍‍‍Amar A [17] ‍‍‍Levene C [17] ‍‍‍Breakefield X [17] ‍‍‍Green M [17] ‍‍‍Frisch A [17] ‍‍‍Fraser D [16] ‍‍‍Peleg L [16] ‍‍‍Kohn R [16] ‍‍‍Lerer I [16] ‍‍‍Eisenberg S [16] ‍‍‍Orr-Urtreger A [16] ‍‍‍Steinitz R [16] ‍‍‍Gelbart T [15] ‍‍‍Leitersdorf E [15] ‍‍ ‍‍Sagi M [15] ‍‍‍Tamir A [15] ‍‍‍Robson M [15] ‍‍‍Argov Z [15] ‍‍‍Boyd J [15] ‍‍‍Eliakim R [15] ‍‍‍Glaeser B [15] ‍‍‍Goldbourt U [14] ‍‍‍Dagan E [14] ‍‍‍Picornell A [14] ‍‍‍Shinar Y [14] ‍‍‍Zaizov R [14] ‍‍‍Fried K [14] ‍‍‍Moses S [14] ‍‍‍Lev D [14] ‍‍‍Castro J [14] ‍‍‍Kramer P [14] ‍‍‍Ben-Baruch G [14] ‍‍‍Figer A [14] ‍‍‍Rosenberg N [14] ‍‍‍Elpeleg O [14] ‍‍‍Zeigler M [14] ‍‍‍Niv Y [14] ‍‍‍Papa M [13] ‍‍‍Aksentijevich I [13] ‍‍ ‍‍Zilber N [13] ‍‍‍Davies A [13] ‍‍‍Baron-Epel O [13] ‍‍‍Kottek S [13] ‍‍‍Oppenheim A [13] ‍‍‍Frydman M [13] ‍‍‍Wacholder S [13] ‍‍‍Barkai G [13] ‍‍‍Nafa K [13] ‍‍‍Abrahamov A [13] ‍‍‍Matalon R [13] ‍‍‍Zamir R [13] ‍‍‍Ramón M [13] ‍‍‍Touitou I [13] ‍‍‍Stein Y [13] ‍‍‍Gabizon R [12] ‍‍‍Weinberger A [12] ‍‍‍Langevitz P [12] ‍‍‍Lubin F [12] ‍‍‍Fidder H [12] ‍‍‍Karban A [12] ‍‍‍Lynch H [12] ‍‍‍Odes H [12] ‍‍‍Benchetrit E [12] ‍‍‍Lancet D [12] ‍‍ ‍‍Achiron A [12] ‍‍‍Gadoth N [12] ‍‍‍Tucker M [12] ‍‍‍Palti H [11] ‍‍‍Brody L [11] ‍‍‍Pinkhas J [11] ‍‍‍Arber N [11] ‍‍‍Kerem B [11] ‍‍‍Yunis E [11] ‍‍‍Kerem E [11] ‍‍‍Carmel S [11] ‍‍‍Kaback M [11] ‍‍‍Hamel N [11] ‍‍‍Witztum E [11] ‍‍‍Brenner B [11] ‍‍‍Weizman A [11] ‍‍‍Leventhal A [11] ‍‍‍Sidransky E [11] ‍‍‍Gruber S [11] ‍‍‍Soffer D [11] ‍‍‍Gurevitch J [11] ‍‍‍Fischel-Ghodsian N [11] ‍‍‍Grabowski G [11] ‍‍‍Barell V [11] ‍‍‍Gajdusek D [11] ‍‍ ‍‍Beller U [11] ‍‍‍Danon Y [11] ‍‍‍Hartge P [11] ‍‍‍Jenkins T [11] ‍‍‍Ostrer H [11] ‍‍‍Rosenmann H [11] ‍‍‍Lusky A [10] ‍‍‍Neufeld H [10] ‍‍‍Brunet J [10] ‍‍‍Satagopan J [10] ‍‍‍Loewenthal K [10] ‍‍‍Yehuda R [10] ‍‍‍Arensburg B [10] ‍‍‍Goldfarb L [10] ‍‍‍Lev E [10] ‍‍‍Shoham-Vardi I [10] ‍‍‍Meiner V [10] ‍‍‍Rennert H [10] ‍‍‍Behar D [10] ‍‍‍Daly M [10] ‍‍‍Kolodny E [10] ‍‍‍Magal N [10] ‍‍‍Pastores G [10] ‍‍‍Rosler A [10] ‍‍‍Norton L [10] ‍‍ ‍‍Apter A [10] ‍‍‍Eldridge R [10] ‍‍‍Brik R [10] ‍‍‍Permutt M [10] ‍‍‍Axelrod F [10] ‍‍‍King M [10] ‍‍‍Micle S [10] ‍‍‍Shaag A [10] ‍‍‍Abramsky O [10] ‍‍‍Bar-Meir S [10] ‍‍‍German J [10] ‍‍‍

”Kaksi kansaa on sinun kohdussasi, kaksi heimoa erkanee sinun ruumiistasi. Toinen heimo on toista voimakkaampi, vanhempi palvelee nuorempaa.” (Gen 25:23.)

Genesis tarkoittaa "alkuja" tai "syntyjä". Esseeni Kansojen Taulustakin käsittelee syntyjä syviä.

Individualistisessa eli yksilökeskeisessä kulttuurissamme ymmärtänemme sen, että Jumala pitää silmällä yksityistä ihmistä.

Raamatun unohdetussa historiankuvassa käsitellään kuitenkin myös kansoja jonkinlaisina yksikköinä

- vaikka ihmisrodut ja etnisten ryhmien eriarvoisuus Kirjoituksissa kiistetäänkin.

Genesiksen kymmenes luku tunnetaan paremmin nimellä Kansojen Taulu. Kansojen Taulu kertoo 70 alkukansan kantaisistä ja alkuperästä.

Käytännössä se vastaa mulattinaisen vaimoksi ottaneen Mooseksen kohdalla kysymykseen:

Pyrkimykseni ei siis ole todistella jo ajat sitten virheelliseksi osoitettua rotuoppia. Kansat ovat sekoittuneet keskenään asetuttuaan alueillensa. Kansojen Taulu on minulle apologeettinen kysymys. Uskon, että pienimmätkin Raamatun yhdentoista ensimmäisen luvun maininnat ovat tärkeitä, koska nämä pelkistetyt väittävät kattavansa sisäänsä lähes kahdentuhannen vuoden ajanjakson. Kokonaisuudessaan Genesis saa tuon kaksituhatvuotisen täyteen ja käsittää siis jakson, joka on samanpituinen kuin muiden Raamatun tapahtumien väittämät yhteensä. (Ajanlaskun alusta alkanutta "Herran aikaa" (anno domini) eli ”lopun aikaa”, ja tulevaisuuteen viittaavia profetioita lukuunottamatta.)

Exodus-sana lienee tutuin kauppojen varauloskäytävän vieraskielisestä nimestä (Exit). Israelin heimojen Egyptistä joukkolähdön ajankohdan on perinteisesti arveltu ajoittuneen ajalle noin 1450 eKr. (1466 eKr. eli 2.537 A.M.? Yleinen mielipide tosin sijoittaa tapahtumat, sikäli kuin niitä koskaan on ollutkaan, parisataa vuotta myöhäisemmäksi, jolloin sen aikaiset Egyptin historian viittaukset eivät tue Egyptiä kohdannutta heikkouden tilaa. Avoimesti sen paremmin egyptiläiset kuin assyrialaisetkaan kirjoitukset eivät koskaan tappioistaan kerro.) Egyptissä oltiin lähes viisisataa vuotta (tai 293 vuotta?), jakso jota Genesis ei enää kata. Tällöin kirja näyttää todellakin painavan aikajakson puolesta eksegeesin vaakakupissa melko tarkalleen yhtä paljon kuin muu Raamattu, olettaen että Uusi Testamentti lasketaan siihen kuuluvaksi. Helsingin yliopiston teologisessa tiedekunnassa pakollisia Vanhan Testamentin opintoja on 2.5 opintoviikkoa. Tämän pitäisi vastata kahden ja puolen viikon täysipäiväistä opiskelua. Kyseisellä kurssilla ehditään käymään läpi lähinnä Vanhan Testamentin kirjojen syntyhistoria. Selväkielellä sanottuna maan korkeimmassa teologisessa oppilaitoksessa annetaan ainoastaan rokotus Vanhan Testamentin infektiota vastaan. (Mikäli satunnainen opiskelija vielä jostakin epähygieenisten tilojen saarekkeista Isorokon tartunnan saisi.)

Genesis 10:25 kuvannee ensimmäistä, suurta kansainvaellusta: ”Ja Eeberille syntyi kaksi poikaa: toisen nimi oli Peleg, sillä hänen aikanansa jakaantuivat maan asukkaat.” (Nimi muistuttaa heprealaista sanaa paalag, jakaa.) Genesiksen kymmenennessä luvussa tämä jae on ainoa, jossa kansan perustajan nimen merkitys kerrotaan (mikä alleviivaa ”jakautumisen” merkitystä.) ”Jakaa”-termi on esimerkiksi eri ilmaus, kuin mitä on käytetty kielten hajotuksen yhteydessä.

Kansojen Taulun emigrantit menivät todellakin "uuteen maailmaan". He olivat pioneereja sanan varsinaisessa merkityksessä. He kiersivät maat ja kolusivat mannut, purjehtivat meret ja raivasivat viidakot. Olemme tottuneet näkemään varhaiset sukupolvet karvaisina luolamiehinä, mutta näyttää siltä, että varhaisten sivilisaatiopesäkkeiden alkuvoima on ollut todella suuri. Kaivaukset Etelä-Afrikassa, Siperiassa, Andeilla ja Ison Valtameren saarilla jaksavat yllättää arkeologeja monimutkaisten kulttuurien artefaktoilla ja arkeologisilla sormenjäljillä, kuten on yritetty edellä osoittaa. Alhaalta hiekan alta paljastuvat pyramidit ja ylhäältä vuorilta paljastuvat kivikaupungit kohoavat tutkijan edessä yhtä yllättäen kuin pääsiäissaaren patsaat ja tuijottavat perään yhtä ilmeettömällä katseella. (Pääsiäissaaren eli Rapa Nuin kaikkiaan noin tuhannella patsaalla on todellakin se yhteinen piirre, että yksikään niistä ei hymyile.) Kansat eivät kunnioita isiänsä ja äitejänsä.

Kansojen Taulun todistusvoima voi piillä vain siinä, että Genesiksestä ja juutalais-kristillisestä traditiosta riippumatta kansat kunnioittaisivat perustajinaan samannimisiä tai tyyppisiä patriarkka-hahmoja. Kansojen Taulun mukaan Baabelin ja Pelegin aikainen hajaantuminen tapahtui viidennessä sukupolvessa vedenpaisumuksen jälkeen. Kansojen Taulu jakaa kansat karkeasti Nooan kolmen pojan, Seemin, Haamin ja Jaafetin mukaan.

Joitakin Kansojen Taulun nimiä ei mainita missään muualla. Nämä nimet on siis joko sepitetty, tai sitten näiden kansojen alkuperä oli jo sekoittunut mytologisiin tarinoihin tai unohtunut kokonaan. Luku kertoo kuitenkin sellaisistakin kansoista, joiden olemassaolo on varmistunut vasta omana aikanamme.

'When all men were of one language, some of them built a high tower, as if they would thereby ascend up to heaven; but the gods sent storms of wind and overthrew the tower, and gave everyone his peculiar language; and for this reason it was that the city was called Babylon....After this they were dispersed abroad, on account of their languages, and went out by colonies everywhere; and each colony took possession of that land which they lighted upon, and unto which God led them; so that the whole continent was filled with them, both the inland and maritime countries. There were some also who passed over the sea in ships, and inhabited the islands; and some of these nations do still retain the names which were given to them by their first founders; but some also have lost them...The Sybil (Josephus. Antiq. i. 5.)

Kuva 1. Etniset ryhmät tai ihmisrodut voidaan jakaa yllättävän selkeästi kolmeen ryhmään. Ihmiskunta on ts. kolmen patriarkan jälkeläisiä (Seem, Haam & Jaafet?) Tutkimusklassikko oli ensimmäinen laajempi kopiolukumuutoksia (CNV, Copy Number Variation) vertaillut antropologinen projekti.

Population clustering from CNV genotypes

SEEMILÄISET KANSAT

Raamatun ulkopuolisissa lähteissä seemiläisinä itseään pitäneitä kansoja olivat heprealaiset, eelamilaiset, assyrialaiset, kaldealaiset, lyydialaiset, aramilaiset, syyrialaiset, uusilaiset, ”puhtaina” arabeina itseänsä pitävät seemiläiset Joktanin arabit, mooabilaiset, ammonilaiset (viimeinen maininta toisella vuosisadalla eKr.), suuahilaiset, midianilaiset, keniittiläiset midianin arabit, ismaelilaiset arabit ja Rooman viranomaisten silmissä rosvojen maineessa olleet iturealaiset. (Myös nykyään kadunmiehet arabit tunnustavat Raamatun mainitsemat Ismaelista polveutuvat 12 arabiheimoa. Esimerkiksi Mohammed jäljitti oman syntyperänsä Kedarin heimoon.)

Dedanin jälkeläisten assurimilaisten ja letusimilaisten sanotaan leireineen olleen vanhojen aikojen kulkureita ja maankiertäjiä. Tunnetuin seemiläisistä kansoista lienevät juutalaiset. Juutalaisvainot ristittiin parisataa vuotta sitten ”antisemitismiksi” ilmeisesti siitä syystä, että juutalaisten marttyyrin sädekehää tahdottiin himmentää. Nürnbergin sotarikosoikeudenkäyntien syytelauselmissakaan ei tahdottu mainita erikseen juutalaisia, vaan käytettiin ilmaisua rikoksista ihmiskuntaa vastaan. (Sen jälkeen kun oikeuteen peräti 18 henkeä saatiin.) Harhaanjohtava termi "antisemitismi" Ranskan Dreyfussin jupakan ajoilta viittaa vain juutalaisvainoihin, mutta seemiläisiä kansoja ovat siis muutkin Raamatussa.

Alfred Dreyfus oli ensimmäinen juutalainen, joka sai kapteenin arvon Ranskan armeijassa. Häntä syytettiin salaisten tietojen luovuttamisesta Saksalle. Ranskan armeijan kunnian sanottiin olleen kysymyksessä ja kaikkia kansalaisia kerättiin yhteen rintamaan puolustamaan maata ulkopuolista uhkaa vastaan. Dreyfus tuomittiin viralta pantavaksi ja eliniäksi Papillon-romaanista tutuksi tulleeseen Pirunsaaren saarivankilaan. Kun todisteet häntä vastaan osoittautuivat väärennetyiksi, tuotettiin uusia. Kaksi vuotta Dreyfusin tuomion jälkeen oikea syyllinen löydettiin ja muuan upseeri tunnusti väärentäneensä todistusaineistona käytettyjä asiakirjoja. Asia yritettiin pitää kuitenkin viimeiseen asti salassa. Vasta pitkällinen oikeustaistelu ja Emile Zolan (^o) kirjanen Minä syytän johti Dreyfusin maineen palauttamiseen. Jupakalla oli laajoja seuraamuksia. Sen voisi sanoa viitoittaneen tietä kirkon ja valtion eroon Ranskassa, sosialistipuolueen perustamiseen ja vihdoin siihen, että Theodor Herzl asettui levottomuuksien keskellä sionistiliikkeen johtoon.

HAAMILAISET KANSAT

Vuodelta 1612 peräisin olevassa, eräässä vanhemmista antropologian teoksista, todetaan Haamin suvusta seuraavaa:

”On havaittu Haamin sukuineen olleen ainoat kaukomatkaajat ja harhailijat tuntemattomiin maihin, tutkien ja asettuen paikoilleen. On myös sanottu tästä suvusta, että minne tahansa se kulki, siellä alkoi ymmärtämättömyys tosi jumalisuudesta... mikään asutettu maa ei tuottanut niin paljon jälkeläisiä eikä asuttanut niin montaa maata.” [1]

Haamista polveutuvia kansoja ovat Raamatun ulkopuolisten lähteiden mukaan mm. etiopialaiset, egyptiläiset, nubialaiset, mausteista kuuluisat sebalaiset nykyisen Jemenin alueella asuvat entiset sabaktalaiset, Vähä-Aasian kappadokialaiset, puutin kansa lähellä Kyreneetä Pohjois-Afrikan rannikolla sekä hivviläiset. (Noin 600 jKr. kirjoitettu Koraani kertoo sebalaisten yli tuhat vuotta palvelleen padon murtumisesta vuonna 542 eKr. ja pitää tapahtunutta Allahin tuomiona.)

Siidonilaiset eli foinikialaiset olivat eteviä merimiehiä. Heettiläiset olivat ensimmäiset, jotka valmistivat rautaa suuressa mittakaavassa. Heettiläisten uskottiin aiemmin olevan täysin kuvittellinen heimo. Sittemmin heettiläiset tunnustettiin ja esimerkiksi suomalaisen historiallisen romaanin tulenkantaja Mika Waltari antoi Sinuhessa kosolti tilaa heettiläisten kuvaukselle. Arudalaisten sotataito oli merkittävä osa Aleksanteri Suuren valloituksissa. Amorilaiset miehittivät jossakin historian alkuluvuissa Babyloniankin. Näiden aikojen kuninkaista muistamme parhaiten Hammurabin, joka tunnetaan myös samansointisena Amurruna tai Josefuksen teosten Amorreuksena. Akkadilaiset tunsivat kansan Amurruna ja sumerilaiset Martuna. Assyrialaisissa lähteissä kerrotaan Genesiksessä vain yhdellä sanalla sivuutettujen hamatilaisten armeijan koon olleen vuonna 853 eKr. arviolta seuraava: 63 000 jalkamiestä, 2000 kevyttä hevosmiestä, 4000 taisteluvaunua ja 1000 kamelimiestä. (Hamatilaiset löivät tapahtuneessa yhteenotossa Assyrian etujoukot.)

Josefus kertoo myös seitsemän Misraimista polveutuneen kansan häviöstä tai häviämisestä verisen Etiopian sodan aikana. (Ludim, Anamim, Lehabim, Naftuhim, Patrusim, Kasluhim ja Kaftorim.) Ludimin ja/tai Lehabimin nimi on säilynyt Lybian, nyttemmin Libyan maa-alueen nimessä Pohjois-Afrikassa. Kaftorim, ai-Kaftor, on kreikaksi Aiguptos joka taas lienee Egypti-sanan arkaainen kantamuoto. Jer. 47:4 kertoo filistealaisten olleen Kaftorin maan jäännös. Tutkijat pitävät filistealaisia yleensä Välimeren saarilta tulleina, mutta Raamattu on eri mieltä ja väittää kansan alkuperän olleen Niilin jokisuistossa, vedenpaisumuksen vesijättömailla.

Vaikka Kaanaan maan asukkaat puhuivat seemiläisiä kieliä, vahvistetaan Raamatun ulkopuolella kansan itse pitäneen esi-isänänsä Haamin poikaa Kanaania. Mainittaessa Kanaan ensi kertaa Genesiksessä Nooan yhteydessä, on viestissä voimakkaan negatiivinen sävy. (Lue: kansa kirotaan.) - Seikka, joka liberaalien raamatuntutkijoiden mukaan tietenkin viittaa koko Genesiksen olevan juutalaisten omia tarkoituksiansa varten sepittämän. Mustaa merkitsevä haamin suvun nimitys on niin ikään saattanut tulla valjastetuksi rasismin vaunujen eteen myöhempinä aikoina, mene ja tiedä. Toisaalta antiikissa kansallisuusryhmiä ei sinänsä rodullisista syistä vainottu juuri lainkaan, mitä harva tietää. Edes Afrikan mustat dominoivista piirteistään huolimatta eivät herättäneet kiusallista huomiota, eikä valkoisten ja mustien avioliittoja katsottu karsaasti.

Israel valtasi myöhemmin kyseisten heimojen maa-alueen ja kirous tekisi syytösten mukaan oikeutetuksi kanaanilaisten hävittämisen. Arkeologian perusteella tiedämme kyseisten kansojen harjoittaneen toimintaa, joka teki pohjat kaikille ihmiskunnan historian myöhäisemmille väkivaltaisille heimoille. Erityisesti kanaanilaiset kunnostautuivat omien lastensa uhraamisessa omaksi taloudelliseksi hyödykseen. Raamatussa puolustuskyvyttömiin kohdistunut väkivalta provosoi aina Jumalan toimintaan. Nykyisen aborttimäärän rinnastus kanaanilaiseen käytäntöön on masentava. (Suomessa tehtiin vuodesta 1973 vuosituhannen loppuun lähes 440 000 aborttia - eläkepommi tulee iskemään lompakkoomme uraanin molekyylipainolla. Esimerkiksi Venäjällä abortoidaan joka toinen lapsi.) Kärjistäen sanottuna oma sukupolvemmekin muuraa esikoisensa talon kivijalkaan turvatakseen onnensa. Raamattu kertoo ”maan oksentaneen” kanaanilaiset ulos. Lääketieteellisessä mielessä oksentaminen suojaa tai puhdistaa elimistön hengenvaarallisilta myrkyiltä.

Nimrodin nimi on säilynyt varsin elävänä omaan aikaamme saakka. Nimi on juontanut mm. Nimurdaan, julmien assyrialaisten sodan jumalaan; Mardukiin, babylonialaiseen jumalten kuninkaaseen, sekä sumerilaiseen jumalaan Amar-utuun. Nimrodin lapsuudesta kertovat tarinat saattoivat kiinnostaa Sigmund Freudia tämän laatiessa oidipusteoriaansa. (Joskin toisinaan on vaikea selvittää, mitkä Freudin ajatuksista menevät kasvosäryn ja kokaiinin suurkulutuksen piikkiin...) Vanhassa Testamentissa ongelmalliseksi noussut ”Taivaan kuningattaren” palvonta ja Tammuksen itkentä liittyvät niin ikään läheisesti Nimrodiin. Vanhan kultin tunnusmerkkinä oli äiti uhrattavan sylivauvansa kanssa, ja kyseessä on ilmeisesti ollut jonkinlainen hämmentävä muunnelma patriarkkojen ennustamasta tulevaisuuden ihmisäidistä syntyvästä Sovittajasta. Sittemmin Taivaan Kuningattaren kultti siirtyi luontevasti maallistuneeseen kristilliseen kirkkoon madonnan ja lapsen muodossa. Roomalaiset muistivat Nimrodin Bacchuksena (bar-Chus, Kuusin poika). Nimrodin mukaan on nimetty eräs Araratin lähistön vuori (Nimrud Dagh), eräs vähämerkityksinen vanhan Baabelin rauniokaupunki (Birs Nimrud) sekä eräs toinen, Assyrian valtakunnan suurimpiin kuuluneista kaupungeista (Nimrud). Huonoon kuntoon päässyttä Kaspian mertakin kutsuttiin parempina päivinään nimellä Mar de Bachu. Sinearin maa ylipäätään tunnettiin paitsi suuren kapinan paikkana, myös Nimrodin maana. Jos kysyy Persianlahden arabeilta tänään, oliko Nimrod historiallinen henkilö - voisin veikata vastausta.

Suurille patriarkoille oli olemassa useimmiten jonkinlainen vastavoima Genesiksessä: Haanokille Lemekinsä, Nooalle Nimrodinsa. Ensimmäiset Vedenpaisumusta edeltäneen maailman sukupuun haarat olivat Seetin ja Kainin suvut. Rikoksensa jälkeen Kain muutti ”Eedenistä itään” Nodin eli kulkurin, rentun tai heittiön maahan. Seetin suvun yhteydenpito Kainin sukuun saattaa olla tietyllä tapaa Raamatun ensimmäinen evankelioimissuhde, seetiläiset pariskunnat kun näköjään nimesivät poikansa toisinaan Kainin suvun mukaan. (Näin tapahtui jopa erityisen häijyn machomies Lemekin nimen kohdalla.) Vanhassa maailmassa nimen käsite oli huomattavasti voimakkaampi kuin nykyään. Eleen on täytynyt olla suuren huolenpidon, rakkauden ja anteeksiannon osoitus. Sukujen välisistä avioliitoista ei kuitenkaan kerrota. Jospa avioliittoa käytettykään ystävyys- ja kauppasiteiden solmimiseen aivan historian alkumetreillä, vaan tytärten myyminen on myöhäisempi keksintö? Keksiessään romantiikan Shakespeare saattoi löytää jotakin alkuperäistä ja unohdettua. (Ainakin Laulujen Laulu eli Korkea Veisu oli keihäänheristäjää ennen.)

Joissakin ajalle 1300 eKr. ajoitetuissa hautafreskoissa haamin jälkeläiset vasallikansoineen erotellaan toisistaan ihonvärin ja ja pukeutumisen perusteella. Egyptiläiset kuvataan punaihoisina, kanaanilaiset ruskeaihoisina ja pitkäpartaisina, nubialaiset mustina, libyalaiset valkeina ja sulkapäähinettä kantavina.

JAAFETILAISET KANSAT

Vanhan maailman mytologiassa varsinkin Jaafetin nimen tapaa useasti. Jaafetilaisista huomionarvoisia kronikoissa ovat erityisesti me itseämme meinä pitävät me. Siis kunnon arjalaiset, sinisilmäiset indoeurooppalaiset. (Vaikka ruotsalaisten mielestä maaottelut voittavatkin aina mongolit.)

Pakanalliset kreikkalaiset käänsivät nimen ”Iapetos” ja kutsuivat häntä ”Taivaan ja maan pojaksi”, samaten kuin monen kansan isäksi. Sanskritin kielellä Jaafet taipuu Intian Veda-kirjallisuudessa ”Pra-Japatiksi”, isä-Jaafetiksi. Hahmon katsottiin olevan aurinko, luomakunnan herra ja elämän alku hänestä polveutuville. Myöhemmin roomalaiset kutsuivat kantaisäänsä ”Iu-Pateriksi”, isä-Joveksi. Jupiter-sanan ja sitä kautta rattoisan lupsakkaan joviaalin (genetiivi Jovis) luonteen etymologia on tässä nimessä. Juppiter merkitsee yksinkertaisesti ”paljaan taivaan alla” ja häntä rukoiltiin myös Pluviuksena eli sateen jumalana. (Myös Assyrian perustajahahmo Assur ylennettiin myöhemmin jumalaksi. Egyptissä ja Roomassa kuninkaat panivat vielä paremmaksi ja ehtivät julistautua jumaliksi jo eläessään.) Antiikin sekavissa maailmansyntymyyteissä esiintyy toisaalta myös Iapetos-titaani. Hesiodoksen mukaan Iapetoksen pitäisi olla Zeuksen setä ja hänen vaimonsa Klymene eli Asia, josta maanosa sitten sai nimensäkin.

Välimeren saarten, kuten Kreetan ja Kyproksen, asukkaiden katsottiin polveutuvan Jaafetista. Jaafetista polveutuivat paflagonialaiset, hyviä hevosia kasvattaneet meedialaiset, joonilaiset, kittiläiset ja iberialaiset. Kimmeriläiset asettuivat alunperin Kaspian meren rannoille. Askenazin jälkeläiset asettuivat alunperin nykyisen Armenian alueelle, mutta myöhäisemmissä juutalaisissa kirjoituksissa kansa assosioidaan goomerilaisten ohella germaanisiksi roduiksi. Kansojen Taululta voi lukea ainoastaan: ”Goomerin pojat olivat Askenas, Riifat ja Toogarma.” (10:3. Myöhemmin saksanjuutalaisista lähtöisin olevia juutalaisia alettiin kutsua Ashkenazimeiksi. Nykyään käsite on laajentunut ja kattaa alleen noin 85 % juutalaisista. Nykyinen nimi ei siis alunperin viittaa niinkään etnisiin seikkoihin, kuin maantieteeseen.) Skyyttalaiset olivat Mustanmeren takaisten arojen liikkuvainen barbaarikansa.

Samoin kuin ”pakana” tarkoitti ei-juutalaista, tarkoitti ”barbaari” ei-kreikkalaista Kyseessä on ns. onomatopoieettinen sana ja se tulee muukalaisten puhumasta käsittämättömästä mongerruksesta. (Kreikkalaiset kutsuivat ulkomaalaisia siten, miltä heidän kielensä kuulostikin: barbarbarbar.) Skyyttalaiset miellettiin barbaareista sivistymättömimmiksi ja Paavali herätti tunteita kuvaamalla seurakunnan yhteyttä:

”Tässä ei ole kreikkalaista eikä juutalaista, ei ympärileikkausta eikä ympärileikkaamattomuutta, ei barbaaria, ei skyyttalaista, ei orjaa, ei vapaata, vaan kaikki ja kaikissa on Kristus.”, Kol. 3:11.

Jaafetin pojasta Tiiraasta katsottiin polveutuneen ”punertavaihoisten ja sinisilmäisten” traakialaisten, joiden entinen historioitsija sanoo viettäneen suurimman osan ajastaan joko hiprakassa tai aivan umpihumalassa. Tiirasta itseään muistettiin myöhemmin Thuraksena (vrt. Thor!), sodan jumalana. Atyras-joki nimettiin nimen perusteella ja on esitetty, voisiko myös arvoituksellista kieltä puhuneet etruskilaiset olla saaneet nimensä samasta kantamuodosta.

Mesekiläisten kerrotaan noin 1200-luvulla eKr. marssineen heettiläisten vuoristokansan yli. Mesekin nimen kerrotaan säilyneen muskovilaisten tai muskoviittien heimon nimessä, joka puolestaan jätti nimensä Moskovan kaupungille. (Ainakin tämä tieto tosin on peräisin juutalaisen Flavius Josefuksen kynästä, joka tahtoi lisätä juutalaisten kirjoitusten arvovaltaa.) Venäläiset ääntävät sanan Moskva, ja sanan vanha assyrialainen muoto on musku. Myöhemmin Vanhassa Testamentissa esitellään Roosin kansa, josta lienee muodostunut venäläisen nimi (russich). Aikanaan ”ryssä”-sana oli suomessakin virallinen ilmaisu ja vapaa sen nykyisestä arvolatauksesta.

Russia-teorialla on kuitenkin kilpailijansa. On myös esitetty, että Venäjän nimi olisi johdettu Skandinaviasta Idäntielle ryöstöretkille lähteneistä varjageista. Varjagien pääosa lienee lähtenyt Sydän-Ruotsista Määlarin alueelta, jonka vanhana nimenä oli Roslagen. Sen asukkaita nimitettiin rhosseiksi tai russeiksi. Varjagivallan keskus oli etelässä Kiovassa, josta käsin Venäjä alkoi kasvaa vuoden 1000 tienoilla. Varsinaisen Venäjän valtakunnan katsotaan saaneen alkunsa v. 862 Ilmajärvelle syntyneestä varjagiruhtinaskunnasta ja Novgorodista.

Elisaa pidettiin kreikan mytologiassa vähän väliä vilahtelevien aeoliaanien kantaisänä. Muutama kaupunki kantoi kyseistä nimeä ja koko ”Tarujen Hellaan”, hellenistisen kulttuurin ja Elyysian kenttien, kreikkalaisten paratiisin, arvellaan viittaavan Elisaan nimeen.

Kiinan Miao-kansa on todellinen helmi jaafetilaisten joukossa. Kansa katsoi olevansa indoeurooppalaista alkuperää ja pyrki läpi vuosisatojen säilyttämään identiteettinsä muiden Kiinan kansojen keskuudessa. Puolet seitsemänmiljoonaisesta kansasta on nykyään hajaantunut laajalti Kaakkois-Aasiaan, mutta Guizhoun maakunnassa vanhan kulttuurin runsaine perinteineen vielä tapaa. Miaoiden keskuudessa sosiaalinen elämä pyörii kiinteästi häiden ympärillä. Perheen arvostus riippuu siitä, miten kauniisti heillä on varaa koristella tytärtään. Mitä hääseremoniaan sitten kuuluu? Juhlallisissa hetkissä ja hautajaisissa tälle vuosisadalle saakka miautsot lukivat jonkinlaisena liturgiana patriarkkojensa kronikan Jaafetin kautta ”maahan” eli ensimmäiseen ihmiseen saakka. Sukuluettelo ei ole täysin sopusointuinen Genesiksen kanssa, mutta tämä seikka saattaa viitata sen aitouteen: kronikka tuskinpa on lähetyssaarnaajilta lainassa. Pääosiltaan luettelo on suppeampi ja keskittyy ainoastaan kyseisen kansan omiin vaiheisiin. Joitakin nimiä on vaikea yhdistää Genesikseen, toisia helpompi. Miautsojen tarinoissa on myös sellaista aineistoa, jota emme voi Genesiksestä varmistaa. Tällaista ovat esimerkiksi Nooan vaimon nimi ja yksityiskohtaisemmat kuvaukset Nooan katastrofin tapahtumista, kuten tulesta ja maanjäristyksistä. Edelleen tarinoissa kerrotaan Baabelin jälkeisestä hajaantumisesta ympäri maapallon. - Mikä on mielenkiintoista siihen nähden, että lähetyssaarnaajien saadessa ensikontaktin kansaan nämä eivät kuulemma ymmärtäneet, mitä heidän omat kirjoituksensa tarkoittivat maan pyöreällä muodolla. Virallisesti Miaojen alkuperää ei tiedetä, mutta varmaa on, että Guizhoun maakunnassa on vallinnut tuhansia vuosia miaoiden elintapoja muistuttava kulttuuri [2, 3]. Katso essee Korkeimman Luoja-Jumalan Shang-Tin palvonnasta muinaisessa Kiinassa ennen taolaisuuden tuloa:

Eurooppalaiset kronikat

1900-luvulla olemme saaneet olla seuraamassa Euroopan viimeisten kuningashuoneiden menneestä vallasta muistoksi jääneen PR-loistonkin himmenemistä.

Keskiaikaisten Eurooppalaisten kirjoitusten nyrkkisääntö oli, että alkuaikoina Seem asettui Aasiaan, Haam Afrikkaan ja Jaafet Eurooppaan. (Australiasta ja Amerikoista ei joko tiedetty, niitä ei muistettu, tai sitten sinne lähteneet eivät olleet lähettäneet osoitteenmuutoskorttia.) Vanhimmat Euroopan kuningassuvut varhaisia brittejä, sakseja [4], Irlannin kelttejä sekä tanskalaisia, eteläruotsalaisia ja islantilaisia myöten, kirjasivat sukuluettelonsa Jaafetiin saakka.

Satunnainen matkailija saattoi kuningatar Elisabethin aikaan nähdä Lontoon kuninkaallisessa palatsissa Englannin kuninkaiden kauniisti kehystetyn sukupuun aina maailman alkuun saakka. - Mikä lienee pönkittänyt veronkerääjän arvovaltaa, olihan eurooppalainen kuningas sitä mitä oli ”Jumalan armosta”. (Tätä sai todistaa muun muassa satunnaisen matkailijan, paroni Waldstein torstaina 6. 7. armon vuonna 1600. Myöhemmin parooni sai tutustua laajaan kirjastoon, jossa sukupuita selvitettiin tarkemmin [5]).

Vanhoille eurooppalaisille kronikoille ei luonnollisesti anneta minkäänlaista historiallista arvoa, vaan niiden katsotaan tulleen keskiajalla katolisten munkkien manipuloimiksi. Tällaisissa tapauksissa todistusvastuu lankeaakin uuden teorian esittäjille. Koska asiaa ei kyetä kiistatta todistamaan, voimme suostua pitämään luetteloja pelkkänä kuriositeettina. Seuraavassa esitetään kuitenkin tuon uteliaisuuden tyydyttämiseksi joitakin uuden (siis vanhan) teorian todisteluja.

Kirjassaan After the Flood Bill Cooper väittää, että perinteinen väärennöstulkinta on tiettyjen kronologioiden kohdalla mahdoton. Väitettään Cooper perustelee muun muassa sillä, että jotkin säilyneistä luetteloista ovat peräisin ajalta ennen kristinuskon saapumista ja monissa viitataan aiempiin jo kadonneisiin, niinikään kristinuskoa vanhempiin, asiakirjoihin.

Kristinusko sinänsä saapui Brittein saarille erityisen aikaisin, vaikka saariprovinssin tiet eivät voineetkaan viedä Roomaan ennen kanaalin tunnelia. On jopa väitetty, että Roomassa invaasion jälkeen panttina pidetyn johtavan heimon jäsenet tulivat evankelioiduksi apostoli Paavalin kautta. Näiden väitteiden mukaan saarivaltio oli siinä mielessä siis poikkeuksellinen, että evankeliumi ei edennyt ruohonjuuritasolta yhteiskuntarakenteissa ylös, vaan toisin päin. ”...niin että koko (keisarillisen?) henkivartioston ja kaikkien muiden (vankien ja hovin?) tietoon on tullut, että minä olen kahleissa Kristuksen tähden.” (Fil. 1:13.) Filippiläiskirje on joutunut liberaaliteologien hampaisiin tietyn katkonaisuutensa tähden. Yleinen käsitys kirjeestä on, että Paavalin nimiin on taidemaalari Rubensin tms. tavoin laitettu hänen oppilaittensa opinnäytetöitä. Tyylinvaihdosten ja katkonaisuuden voi kuitenkin selittää sillä, että Paavali oli kahlehdittu roomalaiseen vanginvartijaan joka vaihtui määräajoin. Paavali itse taas oli hidas kirjoittaja mahdollisen silmävammansa vuoksi. (Mm. sanelut, suurikokoiset kirjaimet, silmänsä tarjonneet galatalaiset ja ylipapin räikeän puvun erottamatta jääminen viittaavat huonoon näköaistiin.) Voisiko ajatella, että tarpeittensa teon ohella Paavali teki vartijoidensa kanssa tuttavuutta myös henkisesti intiimillä tavalla?

Geoffrey of Monmouth -nimisen piispan teos on Cooperin ajatusleikin keskeisimpiä lähteitä. Piispa väitti käyttäneensä lähteenään toista vanhaa kirjaa, mutta tämän olemassaoloa ei ole kyetty todistamaan. Cooper kertoo, miten vanhat asiakirjat kuvaavat historian tapahtumia yli kahden vuosituhannen ajalta. Hän myös kuvaa joidenkin barbaari- ja viikinkikuninkaiden (joiden aikana tiettyjä luetteloja olisi pitänyt muutella) paitsi epäkristillisiä, myös ylipäänsä epähumaaneja tapoja.

Antiikin eurooppalaiset pitivät sukuluetteloiden sabotoimista eräänä raskaimmista rikoksista. Entisinä aikoina omistusoikeudet ja valta perustui hyvin voimakkaasti syntyperään ja esimerkiksi 300-luvun englannissa ”Kambrin lakien” mukaan muukalainen sai maan kansalaisuuden vasta yhdeksännessä polvessa, vähennettynä yhdellä polvella jokaisesta avioliitosta vapaan englantilaisen kanssa. Sama käytäntöhän oli myös juutalaisen kansalaisuuden myöntämisessä Mooseksen laissa (5 Moos 23). Tieto siitä, että 400-500 eKr Englannissa sai verovähennyksiä koulukirjoista, saattaa tulla satunnaiselle nettisurffaajalle yllätyksenä. Musiikin, metallurgian ja kirjallisuuden taitajat saivat täyden vapautuksen yhteiskunnan velvoitteista. Ennen roomalaisten invaasiota vuonna 55 eKr. Englanti oli omille kansalaisilleen suuren yhteiskunnallisen järjestyksen maa. Laki suojeli heikkoja ja kohtalon runtelemia, kunnioitti naisia ja takasi muukalaiselle saattojoukot ja etuoikeudet kauttakulun ajaksi. (Jospa vääränpuoleisesta liikenteestä aiheutuva sekasotku juontaakin juurensa yli kahden vuosituhannen takaisten gentlemannien nurinkurisen kohteliaiseen vieraskoreuteen?) Sosiaalisia velvollisuuksia ja tapoja pidettiin voimassa vaikka väkisin ja ainakin teoriassa vapaalla miehellä oli täysi oikeus äänestää kuninkaan syrjäyttämisen puolesta. Aseenkanto oli kiellettyä siviilikokouksissa ja vapaa mies omisti harpun siinä missä takin ja keittokattilansakin. Maihinnousunsa jälkeen Gaius Julius Caesar kuvaa Brittein saarten idylliä: "Ihmisten lukumäärää ei voi laskea ja rakennustenkin lukumäärään kuluisivat monet luvut." (41, 42) (Saarivaltiolla tosin on edelleen hieman sama ongelma, koska siellä ei käytetä henkilötunnuksia.)

Vakiintunut historiankäsitys ei noteeraa brittien historian kohdalla lainkaan ylöskirjattuja henkilöhistorian tapahtumia ennen roomalaisten tuloa ajanlaskumme alussa. Vanhoja tekstejä vastaan kohdistettu syytös on kuitenkin varsin ankara. Käytännössä se tarkoittaa että muinaisessa historiankirjoituksessa sensuuri toimi tehokkaasti kuin Stalinin Neuvostoliitossa tai Maon Kiinassa. Esimerkiksi William Shakespeare saattaisi ravistella keihästä tällaisen näkemyksen päällä, hän kun kirjoitti ”861-801 eKr.” hallinneesta kuningas Learista - hahmosta jonka edellä mainittu kiistelty teos hyvin tuntee. (Kronikat kertovat Learin saaneen kruunun melko erikoisella tavalla, tämän isän menehdyttyä huonosti valmistellussa lentoyrityksessä. Kruunun kerrotaan siirtyneen pois Brutuksen kuningassuvulta muutama polvi Learin jälkeen.)

Raamatun ulkopuolisissa lähteissä on mainittu monia yksittäisiä, yhteisiä henkilönimiä idän kansojen polveutumisista. Tyypillistä vanhoille sukuluetteloille kuitenkin on, että varhaisimmat ajat ne puhkaisevat vain yhtenä sukupolvien kiilana ja haaroittuvat vasta myöhemmillä vuosisadoilla. Esimerkiksi anglo-saksiset ja skandinaaviset kuningassuvut eroavat keskiaikaisten kopioiden mukaan vasta kahdeksannessatoista sukupolvessa Nooasta [6-11]. Tämä tarkoittaa vähintäänkin sitä, että luettelosta puuttuu välistä sukupolvia. Esimerkiksi Luukkaan taltiomassa Jeesuksen Joosefin puoleisessa sukuluettelossa on 67 suoraviivaista sukupolvea Nooaan, 76 Aadamiin ja 77 ”Jumalaan” (Lk 3).

Yleisemmin tunnustettua on, että Euroopan kuningassuvut ovat toisillensa kaukaista sukua. Kronikoiden mukaan viimeinen yhteinen kantaisä on nimeltään Woden, joka on siinä mielessä kiehtova, että näilläkin kulmilla haksahduttiin korottamaan kantaisä jumalolennoksi. Odin-sana juontanee juurensa tähän nimeen.

Suomalaista (anteeksi maalaisuuteni) kiinnostava maininta on Wodenin esi-isä viidennessä polvessa, joka sekä norjalaisten, tanskalaisten, islantilaisten että Englannin saksien kirjanpidossa on nimeltään Finn, ”vaalea mies.” Kansojen kuninkuuskysymys on mielenkiintoinen jo sinällään. Israelin kohdalla 1. Samuelin kirjan 8. luku käsittelee kuninkuuteen liittyviä väärinkäytöksiä. Meidän on vaikea käsittää, mitä tarkoitti kuninkuus kolme tai neljätuhatta vuotta sitten. Kuningas oli täydellinen itsevaltias ja Jumala ei pitänyt Israelin kuningashankkeesta. Kuningashuoneet ovat varmastikin pyrkineet todistamaan valtansa oikeutuksen patriarkaalisilla sukupuillansa, jos kerran toiset ankkuroivat sen jumaliinkin.

However, Rohde, Olson, and Chang (2004)^[3], using a non-genetic model, estimated that the MRCA of all living humans may have lived within historical times (3rd millennium BC to 1st millennium AD). Rohde (2005)^[6] refined the simulation with parameters from estimated historical human migrations and of population densities. For conservative parameters, he pushes back the date for the MRCA to the 6th millennium BC (p. 20), but still concludes with a "SURPRISINGLY RECENT" estimate of a MRCA living in the second or first millennium BC (p. 27). An explanation of this result is that, while humanity's MRCA was indeed a Paleolithic individual up to early modern times, the European explorers of the 16th and 17th centuries would have fathered enough offspring so that some "mainland" ancestry by today pervades even remote habitats. The possibility remains, however, that a single isolated population with no recent "mainland" admixture persists somewhere, which would immediately push back the date of humanity's MRCA by many millennia. While simulations help estimate probabilities, the question can be resolved authoritatively only by genetically testing every living human individual. Other models reported in Rohde, Olson, and Chang (2004)^[3] suggest that the MRCA of Western Europeans lived as recently as AD 1000. The same article provides surprisingly recent estimates for the identical ancestors point, the most recent time when each person then living was either an ancestor of all the persons alive today or an ancestor of none of them. The estimates for this are similarly uncertain, but date to considerably earlier than the MRCA, according to Rohde (2005) roughly to between 15,000 and 5,000 years ago.^[6] ^[5]."

^ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Most_recent_common_ancestor
^ ^a ^b ^c See the chapter All Africa and her progenies in Dawkins, Richard (1995). River Out of Eden. New York: Basic Books. ISBN 0-465-06990-8.
^ ^a ^b ^c Rohde DLT, Olson S, Chang JT (2004) "Modelling the recent common ancestry of all living humans". Nature 431: 562-566.
^ Notions such as Mitochondrial Eve and Y-chromosomal Adam yield common ancestors that are more ancient than for all living humans (Hartwell 2004:539).
^ ^a ^b Dawkins, Richard (2004). The Ancestor's Tale, A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Life. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. ISBN 0-618-00583-8.
^ ^a ^b Rohde, DLT , On the common ancestors of all living humans. Submitted to American Journal of Physical Anthropology. (2005)
^ Ciccarelli FD, Doerks T, von Mering C, Creevey CJ, Snel B, Bork P (2006). "Toward automatic reconstruction of a highly resolved tree of life". Science 311 (5765): 1283–87. doi:10.1126/science.1123061. PMID 16513982

Hartwell, Leland (2004). Genetics: From Genes to Genomes, Second Edition, Maidenhead: McGraw-Hill. ISBN 0072919302.

KANSAINVAELLUKSET

Vuonna 476 jKr. pantiin viimeinen Rooman keisari viralta. Keskiajan katsotaan alkaneen kansainvaelluksista ennen vuotta 400 jKr., jolloin järjestystä ylläpitänyt ja periferioissa vihattu Rooman valtakunta hajosi. Rooman valtakunnan tuhoa seurannut Eurooppa oli suuri kansojen kattila ja sekoitti kansallisuuspakkaa. Seuraukset eivät suinkaan koskeneet ainoastaan Roomaan, vaan laineita nähtiin esimerkiksi siinä, kun kolme germaaniheimoa, anglit, saksit ja juutit, valtasivat puolustuskyvyttömäksi jääneen Britannian roomalaisvaruskunnan. Kuitenkin esimerkiksi brittien ja Irlannin kelttien sukupuut eroavat Nooasta lukien neljän yhteisen kantaisien sukupolven jälkeen, juuri niin kuin Kansojen Taulu ainakin varhaisimpien kansojen kohdalla ennakoikin. Britit polveutuvat näiden kyseenalaisten sukuluettelojen mukaan Jaafetin pojasta Jaavanista, Irlannin keltit Jaafetin pojasta Maagogista.

Kansojen liikkeistä ei parhaimmalla tahdollakaan voi vetää yksi-yhteen johtopäätöksiä. Vanhoihin kronikoihin uskomalla punaniskaisinkaan preussilainen ei voi sanoa eurooppalaisten olevan yksinomaan ”jaafetilaisia”. Esimerkiksi muinaiset britit karkoittivat alkuperäisväestön, ”Haamista polveutuneet” formosilaiset kirjoitusten mukaan pois saareltaan. (Puolusteluissa formosilaisten kerrotaan olleen ryövärikansa, joka oli naapureilleen alituisena riesana [18]). Samalla tapaa Brittein saarille kerrottiin pöllähtäneen myös skyyttalaisia. Skyyttien katsotaan polveutuvan Jaafetista, muttei Jaavanin vaan Maagogin kautta. Yleensä skyyttalaiset mielletään Mustanmeren pohjoispuolisen aron hasista polttaneeksi ihmissyöjäkansaksi. Skyyttien nimen väitetään säilyneen perillistensä skottien nimessä. Jottei asia kävisi liian selkeäksi, kronikat kertovat silloisten skottien kulkeutuneen vanhojen irlantilaisten kanssa päittäin ja kansojen vaihtuessa nimien vakiintuneen maantieteen, eikä niinkään etnisen historian perusteella. Arvata saattaa, että näistä puheista toinen ryhmä suivaantuu nimensä ja toinen verensä lokaamisesta. (Irlantilaisittain kuohahtava veri on muutenkin hyvässä huudossa Hollywoodissa: http://www.helsinki.fi/~pjojala/Rautatammi_metsurit.htm) Protestanttien ja katolisten riidoissa uskonto on joka tapauksessa usein tekosyy vanhempien ja syvempien skismojen pinnalla.

Eerik Punainen ja Leif Eerikinpoika purjehtivat Amerikkaan todistettavasti 500 vuotta ennen Kolumbusta. ”Ne kaksitoistakin” hajaantuivat Apostolien tekojen lehdillä Jerusalemin vainojen puhjetessa kuin tuhka tuuleen. Luukas siteeraa jouluevankeliumissa Julius Caesarin ottopojan Augustuksen eli Octavianuksen (eli Otto-pojan) käskyä ”koko maailman” verollepanosta. Kristillinen perimätieto arvelee apostolien erkaantuneen ympäri samaa tuolloin tunnettua maailmaa. Tämä maailma tai vaihtoehtoisesti huhupuheet suurista apostoleista eivät kuitenkaan kantautuneet kauempaa kuin Arabiasta, Afrikasta, Isosta Britanniasta ja Tuomaan kohdalla Intiasta.

Kantomatkaltaan kansainvaellukset ovat taktisia tai operatiivisia, mutta mannertenvälinen siirtolaisuus strategista muuttoliikettä. Seikkailijasuvun koon ei ole tarvinnut olla kovin suurikaan, mikäli se on määränpäässä voinut levittäytyä ja lisääntyä vapaana naapureista. Tällaisen suuren luokan muuton on kuitenkin täytynyt tapahtua hyvin varhaisessa vaiheessa ennen alkuperäisten mutaatioiden kertymistä, Sallan-tautien ja sisäsiittoisten perinnöllisten sairauksien välttämiseksi. Esimerkkejä eläinlajien eliömaantieteen nopeusennätyksistä olen kerännyt Helsingin yliopiston biologien ainejärjestölehden artikkeliini osoitteeseen: http://www.helsinki.fi/~pjojala/Lokeronvaltaajat.htm

Jääkauden jälkeiset merenpinnan korkeuden muutokset eivät ole suoraviivaisia. Mannerjään ollessa voimakkaimmillaan Keski-Euroopan ja Pohjois-Amerikan pohjoisosien yllä, lienee merenpinta ollut vastavuoroisesti matalampi. Sittemmin jäätikön sulaminen on peittänyt alleen monet kannakset. Intiaanit saattoivat päästä kuivin jaloin paremmille metsästysmaille Beringin ”salmen” yli ennätyskylmästä Kamtsatkasta. Samoin Australian asuttajat ynnä monet pussieläinten edustajat olisivat päässeet nykyisten Thaimaan ja Indonesian kautta kävellen tai sukupolvittain tasajalkaa hyppien määränpäähänsä [19] tullakseen myöhemmin eristetyksi vedellä ja tsunameilla ja vasta vuosituhanten jälkeen löydetyksi kapteeni Cookin (tai hänen esiantiikin edeltäjäinsä) toimesta. (Eläinlajithan siis levittäytyvät enemmän sukupolvien kuin yksilöiden hypyillä.) Periaatteessa on myös luvallista ehdottaa, että VT:ssä käsitteeksi muodostuneiden ”meren saarten” asuttaminen on tapahtunut laivojenkin avulla.

Israeliin tuotiin Vanhan Testamentin mukaan kultaa "Oofirin maasta". Kuningas Salomon kaivokset ovat romantiikan ajoista alkaen herättäneet nostalgisia tunteita. Raamatussa mainittujen ”Tarsiin laivojen” matkakohdettakaan ei varmuudella tunneta. Jospa syy on se, että paikka oli yksinkertaisesti niin kaukana?

Jotkut maallikko-raamatunselittäjät, joiden harmittomaan ja anteeksipyytelevään joukkoon itsekin kuulun, ovat leikitelleet ajatuksella että kyseisinä kauppakumppaneina olivat Etelä-Amerikan tai jonkin muun kaukaisen mantereen asuttajat. Todistusaineistoa sille, että sijainti olisi Itä-Aasiassa tai Keski-Afrikassa, ovat eksoottiset Tarsiin-tuliaiset. Perinteisesti paikan on ajateltu olleen Iso-Britannia tai Espanja, mutta 2 Aik 9:21 kuvaus kauppatavaroista ei tue ajatusta: ”...kerran kolmessa vuodessa Tarsiin-laivat tulivat ja toivat kultaa ja hopeata, norsunluuta, apinoita ja riikinkukkoja.” Paikan on ajateltu tarkoittavan Espanjaa, koska jossakin vaiheessa Välimerta kutsuttiin Tarsiin mereksi. Riikinkukkojakin kasvatettiin kaikilla Välimeren saarilla. Tietoa ei ole kuitenkaan voitu varmistaa.

On esitetty, että Ezer-Geberistä liikkeelle lähteneet laivat olisivat hajaantuneet kolmeen laivueeseen, josta osa purjehti Sumatran ja Jaavan saarille, osa Afrikan ympäri ”Sofalaan” ja Välimeren kautta takaisin [20]. Omissa kartoissamme kutsutaan tänä päivänäkin eräitä Australiasta pohjoiseen sijaitsevia Melanesian saaria Salomonin saariksi. Raamattu mainitsee apinat ainoastaan Salomon Tarsiin-laivastosta puhuttaessa. Ei tiedetä, mistä apinalajista oli kysymys, mutta apinaa tarkoittava heprean sana koop on intialaista alkujuurta. (Jotta asia olisi vieläkin sekavampi, niin sanan vanhasta merkityksestä ei ole varmuutta, vaan se saattaa viitata johonkin muuhunkin eläimeen [21].)

1 Kun 10:22 kertoo Tarsiin laivoista lyhyemmin. Kuningasten kirjat kuvaavat tavallisesti ihmisten yksityiselämän valintoja tarkemmin, kun Aikakirjat antavat enemmän sijaa yhteiskunnallisesti merkittäville tapahtumille. Hepreaksi kirjaparin nimi on ”Päivien Teot”, jonka muistisääntönä voi käyttää päivän uutisia. Molempien kirjojen kanta on silti sama: suurten tapahtumien taustoihin pääsee kiinni yksittäisten ihmisten pienistä valinnoista.

Kaukomatkaaja-teorian valossa Espanja olisi tavallaan portti kaukaiseen länteen. (Gibraltaria kutsuttiin nimellä ”Herkuleen pylväät”.) Vanhat, kiistellyt kirjoitukset kertovat brittien kantaisäksi esitetyn sankari Aeniaan pojanpojanpojan Brutuksen (josta tarinan mukaan nimi ”britti”) olleen dardanialaisia ja lähteneen purjehtimaan Albioniin (so. legendaariseen Britanniaan) Vähä-Aasian Troijasta. Koko Troijan olemassaolo kiistettiin pitkään, kunnes indigokauppias nimeltä Schliemann kiinnostui kreikkalaisen kirjeenvaihtoystävättärensä kautta kauniin Helenan tarusta niin, että kaivoi kaupungin esiin - ”Homeroksen” satujen maantieteen pohjalta. (Vanhan kynäniekan omaakin olemassaoloa pidetään ”homeerisena” kysymyksenä.) Senaikaiset arkeologit pitivät Troijaa antiikin kreikkalaisten vihollisisten mystistämisenä, mielikuvituksena joka kuului samaan sarjaan kentaurien kanssa. Lontoon vanha nimi oli tuhat vuotta Troia Newydd, "Uusi Troija"! http://www.annomundi.com/history/index.htm

Herodotoksen ”Historiat”-kirjakokoelman alku on jokseenkin omituinen. Hän aloittaa kirjansa kertomalla kansojen vihamielisyyden ja sotien syistä ja lataa paperille ensi töikseen lukuisia esimerkkejä kuninkaantytärten ryöstöistä. Tieteenalana arkeologia on syntyisin myöhäiskeskiajalta tai varhaisrenesanssista, jolloin kiinnostavinta, mutta myös luotettavinta kartastoa olivat Raamatun tapahtumapaikat. Ennen kuin mesopotamialaisen nuolenpääkirjoituksen salaisuus ratkaistiin, oli Raamattu ainoa kirjallinen lähde, joka ohjasi arkeologien kaivauksia. Pienimpiäkin Raamatun viittauksia käytettiin hyväksi vanhojen suurkaupunkien etsinnöissä. Sumerilaisilla ei ollut papyrusta, joka vaatii kasvaakseen tulvivan maaperän. Myös kivestä oli pulaa, joten kirjalliset muistiinpanot tehtiin kosteaan saveen puisella kiilamaisella puikolla. Kiilan asentoa muuttamalla saatiin aikaan erilaisia kuvioita ja siten eri symboleja - josta nimi nuolenpäkirjoitus.

Tiedoista, jotka koskevat paria kolmea ajanlaskumme alkua edeltänyttä vuosituhatta, tuntevat historiantutkijat kiitollisuutta pääasiassa kolmelle miehelle, jotka olivat kaikki kreikkalaisia. Huomattavin heistä oli Herodotos, joka eli vuosina 484 - 425 eKr. (Jo vanha Cicero (106-43 eKr.) nimitti Herodotosta ”historiankirjoituksen isäksi”.) Herodotosta kiitetään erityisesti siitä, ettei hän ollut pelkkä muistiinmerkitsijä, vaan yritti etsiä myös tapahtumien syitä. Toinen huomattava historioitsija oli Polybios, joka eli vuodesta 201 vuoteen 120 eKr. Polybios oli Herodotoksen tavoin kiinnostunut maailmankuvaa laajentavista tutkimusretkistä. Polybiosta seurasi vuonna 63 eKr. syntynyt Strabon, joka jatkoi elämäntyönään edellisen historiankirjoitusta. Strabonia kiitetään myös maantieteen merkityksen oivaltamisesta. Herodotoksen, Polybioksen ja Strabonin ansiota on, että muutaman ennenvanhaisen tutkimusmatkailijan nimet ovat säilyneet jälkipolville. Tällaisia ovat esimerkiksi Egyptin kuningatar Hatsepsut ja tiedonhaluinen faarao Neko (vaikkeivät nämä itse laivaan astuneetkaan), Hanno-niminen karthagolainen, sekä kreikkalainen Pytheas.

Pytheas retkeili noin 330 eKr. Britanniassa ja Hebridien ja Orkneyn saarilla ja saapui sieltä viiden päivän purjehduksen jälkeen ‘kaikista maista kaukaisimpaan’ eli Thuleen, joka lienee tarkoittanut lähinnä nykyistä Norjaa. 3500 vuotta sitten tehtyä retkeä Punaisen merta pitkin Puntin maahan pidetään varhaisimpana löytöretkenä, josta on säilynyt tietoja. Raamatussakin käsitellään sivumennen suurempia ja pienempiä löytöretkiä, mutta siellä retkikuntien jäsenten lisäksi myös kapteenit ovat anonyymejä. Raamattu ei ole individualistin kirja.

Varhaisimpia löytöretkiä tekivät kauppiaat. Tyypillistä niille oli se että merireitit, määränpäät ja matkakohteet pyrittiin salaamaan kilpailevilta valtioilta. Koska merta ei myöskään voi kulkea maisemien mukaan tai suuntaviittoja seuraten, onko ihme, ettei vanhoista reiteistä tiedetä paljoa? Näyttää siltä, kuin edestakainen matka sadunomaiseen Tarsiiseen olisi kestänyt kolme vuotta. Herodotoksen kuvaama Afrikan ympäripurjehdus kesti pitkään, koska miehistö eli maihin kylvämänsä viljan turvin ja joutui odottamaan paikallaan kylvökauden. Tarsiin matkasta ei kuitenkaan anneta tällaista kuvaa. Kun Joonalle sanottiin Israelissa: ”itään Niiniveen”, hän otti ja lähti länteen Tarsiiseen. Niinive lienee ollut tunnetuimpia senaikaisista suurkaupungeista ja Tarsis jonkinlainen vastakohta sille.

Niiniveen kohdalla Raamattu muuten oli arkeologeja edellä. Kaupunkia ei pitkään uskottu olleen koskaan olemassakaan. Joonan kirjan viimeinen jae kuuluu: ”Enkö minä siis armahtaisi Niiniveä, sitä suurta kaupunkia jossa on enemmän kuin satakaksikymmentä tuhatta ihmistä, jotka eivät tiedä kumpi käsi on oikea, kumpi vasen, niin myös paljon eläimiä?”

Israelilaiset itse olivat ja pysyivät aina maakrapuina, eikä savinen Jordankaan ollut verrattavissa Damaskon kirkkaisiin jokiin. (Vrt. 2 Kun 5:8 ja nöyrtyneen fariseus Paavalin kastaminen Apt 9:ssä muihin virtoihin kuin Johannes Kastajan Jordaniin. Syyrialainen Naeman ylenkatsoi Jordania niin ikään.) Israelissa lähinnä pelättiin merta - mutta sen naapurissa sattui asumaan merenkulkijakansa!

Juutalaiset ylistivät naapuriensa foinikialaisten tammi- ja seetripuisia ”laulavia laivoja”. Nykytutkimus tietää varsin vähän kadonneista foinikialaisista kaupankävijöistä ja vielä vähemmän heidän valtakuntansa perustasta, laivastosta. Yhtään foinikialaista alusta ei ole löydetty (mahdollisesti erästä vuonna 1998 tehtyä löytöä lukuunottamatta), ja niistä on säilynyt vain muutamia kuvia nykypäivään. Jatkuvasti kertyy kuitenkin lisää todistusaineistoa sille, että Foinikiasta olisi seilattu lähes maailman joka kolkkaan. Varmuudella ja viimeistään tyroslaiset uskaltautuivat Herkuleen pylväiden läpi Atlanttia valloittamaan 700 eKr. Vanhoissa teksteissä heidän kerrotaan purjehtineen Afrikan ympäri noin 600 eKr. ja Brittein saarillakin he näyttävät käväisseen. Kun 60-vuotias biokemisti siirtyi projektistani eläkeputkeen ja tuli puhetta hänen konsultaatiostansa kiikkustuolista, kuului vastaus: "Jo muinaiset foinikialaiset keksivät ratkaisun tähänkin ongelmaan".Varhaisimmat säilyneet juutalaiset kolikothan ovat yllättävän myöhäiseltä ajalta, ei paljon Nasaretin raksamiehen aikaa ennen.

Hesekiel 27 kertoo kymmenistä foinikian pääkaupungin Tyyron kauppakumppaneista ja nostaa Tarsiin erityisasemaan niiden joukossa: ”Tarsis oli kauppatuttusi sinun kaikkinaisten rikkauksiesi runsauden takia: hopealla, raudalla, tinalla ja lyijyllä he maksoivat sinun tavarasi... Tarsiin laivat kuljettivat sinun vaihtotavaroitasi. Niin sinä tulit täpötäyteen ja ylen raskaaseen lastiin merten sydämessä. Soutajasi veivät sinut suurille vesille.” (Hes 27:12, 25-26.) Raamatussa Tarsiin käsite on samankaltainen kuin Honolulu, Timbuktu, tai Ameriikan raitti korpisuomalaisille. Toisaalta ”merten sydän” saattaa viitata Välimereen suurempien merten pohjukassa. Todennäköisesti Tarsis tarkoitti Espanjaa.

Rooman imperiumin levitessä vallattujen alueiden asukkaat Britanniasta Mustallemerelle luopuivat sankoin joukoin jopa perityistä kansallisista henkilönimistään, omaksuakseen puhtaasti latinalaisia nimiä. Tutkimukset eivät ole kyenneet osoittamaan eroavaisuuksia edes Espanjassa ja Romaniassa kirjoitetun latinan välillä, mikä on ällistyttävää apinointia. Euroopan paikallisista kielistä ei näin monissa ellei suurimmassa osassa tapauksia ole jäänyt minkäänlaista kirjallista muistomerkkiä, piirtokirjoitusta tai käsikirjoitusta. Näin ei käynyt idässä, eikä varsinkaan Israelissa. Latina jätti mitättömän vähän etymologisia jälkiä sen ajan kreikkaan tai hebreaan. Latina ei saanut jalansijaa, vaikka sitä pakotettiin viralliseksi kieleksi. Latinalaiset lainasanat kreikassa olivat harvinaisuuksia verrattuna siihen suureen kreikkalaisten lainasanojen määrään, joka tuli latinaan kreikkalaisten sivistysvaikutteiden myötä. Idässä tunnettiin omat juuret paremmin kuin Euroopassa. Etenkin hebrea säilyi luonnonkielenä. Nykyisen Euroopan romaaniset kielet ovat puhutusta vulgaarilatinasta eriytyneitä. Varhaisimmin kirjallisen asun sai ranska, jonka "Strasbourgin valat" vuodelta 842 on varhaisin todistuskappale romaanisista murteista erillisenä kielenä. Ranska ja englanti kehittyivät maailmankieliksi niitä puhumalla. Keskiajan latinan mahtiasema oli todella omituinen. Se perustui siihen, että tätä kieltä oli puhunut ja sitä kirjoittanut eurooppalaisten kansojen yhteiset valtiolliset ja kirkolliset esi-isät, jotka kadottivat omat Kansojen Taulun juurensa. Latinan maailmankieli oli kieltä, jota kukaan ei enää puhunut missään äidinkielenään, vaan joka opittiin ainoastaan kirjoista. On ironista, että latinan mahtiaseman tuhosivat lopulta sen kiihkeimmät ihailijat, "humanistit", jotka 1300-luvulta alkaen tahtoivat palauttaa latinalle sen vanhan monimutkaisemman kielioppinsa ja sanontansa. Hankkeessa pyrittiin jopa laskemaan vuodet vanhan roomalaisen mallin mukaisesti ab urbe condita eli "kaupungin perustamisesta", eikä enää Kristuksen syntymästä.

MIESPOLVET VAIPUVAT UNHOLAAN

Pääosa Euroopan vanhoista kansoista tunsi eepoksissaan myös melko äskettäisen luomisen ja vedenpaisumuksen. Ennen kristinuskon saapumista aikaa laskettiin Anno Mundi, ”jälkeen luomisen”. Anglo-saksien Parkerin Kronikassa lasketaan luomisesta olleen kulunut 5200 vuotta Anno Domini, ”armon vuonnamme” 6 (siis jälkeen ajanlaskumme alun, jKr) [13]. Ajatusrakennelma miljoonista vuosista maailman ikänä on monille kulttuureille aivan vieras aina 1700-luvun Huttoniin ja Lyelliin sekä Euroopassa orastaneen kehitysopin geologisten puitteiden esittelyyn saakka [14]. Teoreettisen ateismin laita on kokolailla samoin. Antiikin epikurolaisten ja stooalaisten kaudella, jolloin ei ollut aikaa kuin ”uutta kuulemaan ja uutta oppimaan” (Apt 17:21), oli keksinnössä vielä jotakin uutuudenviehätystä [15].

Laudin Kronikka kertoo saman ajan (5200 vuotta) taittuneen vuoteen 11 jKr. mennessä. Muinaiset saksilaiset kronikat kertovat luomisesta vedenpaisumukseen olleen 2242 ”talvea” ja luomisesta ristiinnaulitsemiseen olleen 5226 vuotta. Brittiläiset kronikat ovat samoilla linjoilla luomisen ja vedenpaisumuksen välillä, mutta kertovat luomisen tapahtuneen ajalla noin 4000 eKr. Olisi mielenkiintoista tietää, mihin saksit laskelmansa perustivat, sillä Ussherinkin käyttämän Vanhan Testamentin latinannos Vulgata antaa epäsuorasti ymmärtää aikaa luomisesta vedenpaisumukseen kuluneen 1656 vuotta [16]. Vanhan Testamentin kreikankielinen versio Septuaginta tulkitsee ajanjakson olleen vähintään 2256 vuotta.

Toisistansa tietämättä muinaiset Väli-Amerikan mayat ja heidän vähintään 600 vuotta myöhäisemmät eurooppalaiset seuraajansa kilpailivat keskenään vuotuisen kalenterin tarkkuudessa, kuten on jo edellä mainittu. Kummallakin mantereilla ajateltiin luomisesta kuluneen karkeasti ottaen yhtä paljon aikaa. Tämän lisäksi on hätkähdyttävää tietää, että kummassakin kulttuurissa maailman iän tutkimusta pidettiin niin kiinnostavana, että ikää pyrittiin määrittämään myös rekisteröityjen taivaankappaleiden ilmiöiden kuten auringon- ja kuunpimennysten avulla.

Eurooppalainen Joseph Scaliger (1540-1609) etsi päivämäärää, jolloin kolme kalenteritapahtumaa taakse päin laskettuna osuisivat samalle vuodelle, maailman luomisvuodelle [17]. Kalenterit osuvat yhteen ”juliaanisen jakson” välein, joka 7980. vuosi. (28x19x15 = 7980 vuotta. (Gaius Julius Caesar sai nimensä säilymään paitsi juliaanisessa kalenterissa, myös keisarin arvonimessa niin lännessä kuin idässäkin. ((Kei)tsaari.) Keisarinleikkaus sen sijaan sai nimensä muita teitä.)

Scaliger metsästi luomisen aamua, mutta mayat olivat vähemmän kunnianhimoisia ja pyrkivät määrittämään ainoastaan Vedenpaisumuksen ajankohtaa. Mayat tutkivat auringon- ja kuunpimennysten sekä Venuksen kierron samanaikaisia tapahtumia. Havainnoissaan intiaanit olivat hyvin huolellisia [17]. Aurinkokunnan kappaleiden ratojen muutoksista syitä hakevan katastrofimallin valossa mayat olivat järkevän varovaisia. (Immanuel Velikovskyn tähdittämässä teoriassa maaplaneetan radan pieni muutos sysäsi liikkeelle vedenpaisumuksen lieveilmiöineen, mikä tarkoittaisi kalenteripakan sekoittuneen katastrofin aikana.) Scaligerin kalenteri pitää maailman synnyinvuotena vuotta 4713 eKr, mayojen kalenteri vedenpaisumuksen vuotena vuotta 3113 eKr. Tämä jättäisi tapahtumien väliseksi jaksoksi noin 1600 vuotta, mikä on karkeasti ottaen samaa luokkaa, kuin Ussherin oletuksilla laskettu luku.

Näillä tarkoilla vuosiluvuilla en tahdo väittää mitään muuta, kuin että maailman iästä oltiin aikoinaan hyvin kiinnostuneita, ja että maailman katsottiin ylipäänsä olevan nuori. En voi osoittaa aukottomasti, ettäkö geologisilla aikajaksoilla vietäisiin ihmisiltä suhteellisuudentaju tai ettäkö nämä menetelmät olisivat sopimuksenvaraisia ja riippuisivat toinen toisistaan. Joitakin ajatuksia sentään:

                            SHEM (48)
             ------------------|------------------
           Elam    Asshur    Arphaxad    Lud    Aram
           (49)    (50)      (51)        (52)   (53)
                               |                 |
                               |                 |
                         (58) Shelah     ------------------------
                               |         Uz   Hul   Gether   Meshech
                               |        (54) (55) (56)     (57)
                               |
                         (59) Eber
                               |
                         --------------
                     (74) Peleg   Joktan (60)
                         |            |
    ----------------------            |
(75) Reu   ------------------------------------------------------------
    |      | Sheleph | Jerah    |   Uzal | Obal | Sheba | Havilah |
    |      | (62)     | (64)     |   (66) | (68) | (70) | (72)    |
(76) Serug |          |          |         |        |       |         |
    |      |          |          |         |        |       |         |
    |   Almondad Hazarmaveth Hadoram Diklah   Abimael Ophir     Jobab
    |   (61)      (63)         (65)     (67)     (69)     (71)      (73)
    |
(77) Nahor
    |
(78) Terah
    |
------------------
Abram   Nahor   Haran
(84)    (83)    (79)
|                |
|              Lot (80)
|            ----------
|           Moab   Benammi
|           (81)   (82)
--------------------------------
                                |
----------------------------------------------------------------
Ishmael   Isaac   Zimran   Jokshan   Medan   Midian   Ishbak   Shuah
(100)     (99)    (98)     (94)      (93)    (87)     (86)     (85)
|                           |                -----------¿
|                       ----------       ----------------------
|                     Sheba   Dedan     Ephah | Henoch | Eldaah
|                     (95)    (96)      (88) | (90)   | (92)
|                                |          Epher     Abidah
|                                |          (89)      (91)
|                     -----------|-----------
|                  Asshurim   Letushim   Leummim
|                             (97)
-------------------------------------
   -------------------------------------------------------------------
Nebioth Kedar | Mibsam Mishma Dumah | Hadad Tema | Naphish Kedemah
(101)    (102) | (104)   (105)   (106) | (108) (109) | (111)    (112)
             Adbeel                  Massa           Jetur
             (103                    (107)           (110)