Posted on 12/15/2008 7:09:16 AM PST by SunkenCiv
Father William Sanchez wears a Star of David pendant on the same chain as his crucifix, and he keeps a menorah in his parish office. After a DNA test confirmed his Sephardic roots, the Albuquerque priest has been actively reconciling this discovery with his Catholic beliefs... Looking back over his childhood in New Mexico, Sanchez now recognizes the Jewish signs: his parents shunning pork, spinning tops during Christmas and covering the mirrors at home if someone in the family died... For small populations in Africa and Asia, genetic research has shed light on claims of Jewish ancestry and provided a better understanding of Jewish migration over thousands of years... This commonality inspired research in the 1990s that found the Cohen Modal Haplotype, a set of six identical genetic markers shared among Ashkenazic and Sephardic Kohanim, passed from father to son on the Y chromosome, which doesn't change much over time and may have originated with a common ancestor. While the genetic markers alone do not prove the existence of Aaron, they can be seen to confirm a biblical tradition. The haplotype, however, is also not unique to Jews -- Kurds, Armenians, southern and central Italians share these same markers but to a lesser extent. Jewish genetic testing is also being used to better understand historic Jewish migration patterns. For instance, the Lemba, a southern African tribe that claims a longstanding Jewish heritage, were found to have Semitic genetics, including the Cohen haplotype. While their connection doesn't trace back directly to biblical Israel, their genetic heritage does seem to have a basis that likely originated with Diaspora Jews.
(Excerpt) Read more at jewishjournal.com ...
:’) The Bar Mitzvah is a process and ceremony boys undergo to enter both manhood and to become adult Jews. :’) In the US at least, there’s the Bat Mitzvah, which was devised (I believe in this country) in the past hundred years or so as the analogous process and ceremony for girls.
Those things he described are traditional behaviors which are passed down by practice rather than DNA. The ones in my own family are pretty minor by comparison, but my Jewish ancestors are, hmm, a couple of hundred years back, and in a different country. :’)
Wow, that is interesting. Wonder if they have tested any Ukrainian Jews?
If she's in maternal line, go here and order your kit.
I did a while ago (I checked my Y-chromosome) and found out that--although a Jew--my Y-chromosome was pure Celtic. My father's line comes from a Mahoney, a Pickering or a Nicholson. How long ago, I don't know.
“old family rumors...determined with a DNA test?”
The presence of certain genes might confirm something, but the absence would not necessarily prove anything. Since genes come in pairs, and only one is passed to the offspring, there is a 50/50 chance of the gene not being passed on, unless both chromosomes had the target gene. By all means search family records, old census data, etc.
Bizarre headline.
How could Jewish heritage be good or bad? It just is, or isn't.
It’s not that — it’s a kind of good news, bad news thing. When the DNA testing first became available, some really-into-it genealogists learned that they weren’t really descended from both of the people they thought were their parents. :’) And somewhere on FR there’s a topic or two about descendants of slaves who, using the testing, found out they were mostly not African in ancestry.
Mine, if in fact any, are way back, and in another land, too...unless you ask the Mormon relatives of my paternal grandmother.
If I was to practice my own lineage of custom and behavior, I’d probably have to become a cattle rustler or a, non contracted, privateer.
Shiver me timbers, get along little doagies.
Yes, that could be bad. :-)
In my own case my ‘German’ great grandfather, came to this country as a stowaway in the late 1800’s. This man is a complete mystery as there is no evidence found that the name he used was his given name from birth. I have found that many that came from Germany pre-1900 changed their names and melted into this nation.
Abraham had three branches of offspring, and there should be corresponding genetics from Abraham to those three branches. It sure would be helpful if genetic researchers had in hand as to compare from the DNA of Abraham and the three women, as well as Issac and Rebekkah. Or even the DNA of Aaron or the fathers and their wives of the twelve tribes to make an airtight case.
I do not give much weight to claims without that DNA as foundation.
my 'German' great grandfather, came to this country as a stowaway in the late 1800's. This man is a complete mystery as there is no evidence found that the name he used was his given name from birth. I have found that many that came from Germany pre-1900 changed their names and melted into this nation.Don't say that too loud, we still need the border fence. ;') I had a relative by marriage who I knew under just one name, he died in 1969 at age 72. His widow, my cousin, died in 1989 at 92 (almost 93). Sometime in the 1990s my dad just offhand happened to mention that the dead guy's real name was something different, that he was born in England, and had emigrated to Canada, finally entering the US around 1930. He served in two or three different armies (both World Wars) under at least two different names. :'D They never had children.
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