Did Israel's Lost Tribes end up in Afghanistan?

Reuters ^ | 03 FEB 2002 | Tom Heneghan

[CommiesOut]

Did Israel's Lost Tribes end up in Afghanistan?

By Tom Heneghan

KABUL, Feb 3 (Reuters) - Considering all they shunned and shattered in their quest for pure Islam, Afghanistan's now vanquished Taliban seem to have overlooked the awkward legend that they were descended from the Lost Tribes of Israel.

The Pashtun tribes that produced the Taliban, one of the most zealous sects the Muslim world has ever seen, have traditionally traced their roots to the Jews who disappeared after the Babylonian Captivity in the sixth century B.C.

The legend, which seems bizarre in light of Jewish-Muslim tensions since the creation of Israel in 1947, is the cornerstone of the complex genealogies delineating the proud Pashtun tribes of Islamic Afghanistan and Pakistan.

With Afghanistan in the news since September 11, Jewish-interest media and Internet sites in Israel and the United States have begun taking a closer look at the unusual legend.

Despite their virulent anti-Semitism, the Taliban themselves apparently ignored the legend that educated Pashtuns find historically unlikely and politically uncomfortable.

"They were only interested in the narrow religious aspect of things," explained Nehmatullah Ander, director of the International Institute for Pashtu Studies in Kabul.

The Taliban barred women from work and school, blew up the huge ancient Buddha statues of Bamiyan and banned television, kite-flying and squeaky shoes as insults to Islam.

They also declared that Pashtunwali, the strict Pashtun tribal code of honour and revenge, was un-Islamic and ordered Ander's institute to stop academic research into it.

"They opposed Pashtunwali, but only because they wanted Sharia (Islamic) law to be supreme in Afghanistan," Ander said.

Abdul Shukoor Rishad, the doyen of Afghan historians with 30 books on history and literature to his name, said Taliban intellectual pursuits were limited.

"The Taliban only published two books, and there were both about theology," he said.

OUT OF BABYLON?

The 20 million or so Pashtuns, fabled guardians of the wild mountains of eastern and southern Afghanistan and Pakistan's Northwest Frontier, boast a complex tribal society organised according to genealogies reaching back to Biblical times.

Their founding legend starts in the 10th century B.C. with Afghana, a supposed grandson of Israel's King Saul and commander of King Solomon's army unmentioned in Jewish scriptures.

It then jumps four centuries ahead to ancient Babylon, where emperor Nebuchadnezzar had taken the Twelve Tribes of Israel as slaves after conquering them in the 6th century B.C.

"There was not enough room in Babylon, so he sent 10 tribes to the east," Rishad recounted. "They settled near Isfahan in Iran, in a city called Yahudia."

Pashtun legend says the Jews then moved into the central -- and non-Pashtun -- Afghan region of Hazarajat, and later spread south to Quetta, in present-day Pakistan, and east to the Indus river.

Rishad rejects this theory, which first found its way into print in about 1612 in Delhi, where a Moghul court scribe wrote Makhzan-i-Afghani (Origin of the Afghans).

"This book was hastily written by enemies of the Afghans," Rishad said, adding it ignored ancient Persian, Hindu and Greek writings, including Herodotus, where no Jewish origin is ever mentioned.

Sir Olaf Caroe, a prominent British historian of the Pashtuns, called the legend "all great fun" but concluded it was too riddled with inconsistencies to be true.

JEWISH NAMES?

That has not stopped the quest for the Lost Tribes from turning once again towards Afghanistan, one of many countries where researchers hope to track down the vanished Jews.

"The Pathans (Pashtuns) have the custom of circumcision on the eighth day. This is a known Jewish custom," wrote Rabbi Marvin Tokayer in an article on a Jewish-interest Web site called Moshiach (Messiah).

"The Sabbath is considered a day of rest and they do not labour, cook or bake," he wrote. "Pathans have the custom of Kosher, dietary laws same as Jews."

"Dozens of Pashtun names and customs sound Jewish," the Jewish Telegraphic Agency wrote. Researchers link Pashtun and Jewish tribe names such as Afridi (Ephraim), Yusufzai (Joseph), Shinwari (Shimon) and Rabbani (Reuben).

The Jewish Bulletin of Northern California recently recounted the legend that the name Kabul "stands for Cain and Abel".

This interest in the Lost Tribes legend exasperates Rishad, 80, who has fielded foreign queries about it for decades and is convinced the legend began with that Delhi court scribe.

"The names don't mean anything," he argued, adding that many Christian, Muslim and Jewish names shared common roots.

"Christians have names that were originally Jewish and they're not Jewish, are they?" he said.

Rishad is so convinced the legend has no basis in fact that he has turned down a large grant to research it further.

"There is an association in California that is searching for the Lost Tribes," he said. "When I was there in 1995, they were ready to provide me enough money for a new study.

"I turned it down because the theory is wrong. Afghans are not Jewish."

[Diogenez]

I've seen reports recently that tribal peoples in Southern Africa and China share Jewish or Hebrew DNA.

But I read here a report from Hebrew University that the DNA structure of most Jewish people is not Semetic (though the Jewish language is), but is Indo-European and is closest to the Indo-European Kurdish People. But the joker in the deck is, well, so are the Palestinians.

[AGAviator]

Heaven forbid he would have ever set foot in lands occupied by those people.

[Young Rhino]

This story begs for a Mel Brooks' movie, or at least a Broadway play. :-)

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

ping!

[rmlew]

One needs to remember though that the Romans did not evict the majority of Palestine's Jewish population. They remained enough of them for two more rebellions long after the fall of Jerusalem in the 1st century. A long standing issue of difficulty was the barbaric business of deforming male babies at birth, but one this the Romans finally relented and/or just gave up. The majority of the children of ancient Israel today are no doubt Arabs, particularly in Palestine. How else can one explain the irrational obstinancy of Biblical proportions on both sides?

The Romans were many things including meticulous record keepers. They were very clear about expelling and/or enslaving most Judean Jews (as opposed to those already in diaspora communities) after the Bar Kochba rebellion which ended in 133 CE. For 100 years before then, the Romans had pursued a policy of colonialization of Greek and Hellenized Syrian migration into Judea. After 133 the Romans implemented a policy of deJudaizing Judea. They renamed the province Palestine after the extinct Phillistines and renamed Jerusalem Aeolia Capitolina, building a pagan sanctuatry on Mt. Moriah.
There were a few more rebellions, the last one around 630 during the last Persian-Byzantine war. However, by that point, a majority of the population in Byzantine occupied Judea was Greek-Christian. The 1/3 of Palestinians whose families actually from the are actually from Palestine (as opposed to Arab immigrants from (1890-1947) are decended from converts (voluntary and foreced) as well as of Arabs who settled in land grants given to veterans by the Abbasid Fatamid Caliphates.

[rmlew]

Why? Assuming the tenious theory is true, it makes no difference. They are no longer Israelites, having forsaken the faith and actually declared war on Israel.

At any rate, our war with Al Quada had nothing to do with the Pashtuns, but with Al Quada attacks on the US.
Of course, you are free to spin anti-zionist/semetic conspiracy theories all you want. They have a wide audience among the Saudi and other arabs funding Al Quaeda.

[Goblins]

What a joke, the Tribe of Judah has never been a lost tribe of Israel... but where are the missing ten tribes they must be out there as parts of the bible are addressed to them even though they are missing.

[blam]

Bump for you.

[Alouette]

This is not a "startling new discovery" and it has been discussed here before.

Article in Jewish magazine, published in 1843

[LostTribe]

>the awkward legend that they were descended from the Lost Tribes of Israel.

Yes, that legend is particularly awkward, considering it was Jews who were removed in the Babylonian Captivity, not the other 10 Lost Tribes. They were removed earlier in the Assyrian Captivity.

>where emperor Nebuchadnezzar had taken the Twelve Tribes of Israel as slaves after conquering them in the 6th century B.C.

Wrong again. The 6th century captivity was of the Southern Kingdom, the Jews, consisting primarily of the tribe of Judah. The 10 Lost Tribes left over a hundred years earlier.

>Afghanistan, one of many countries where researchers hope to track down the vanished Jews.

Again, the basic premise is defective. The search for the Lost Tribes of Israel is not a search for lost Jews. The Lost Tribes were never Jewish. At this point, the entire premise falls apart

To see the real story of the Lost Tribes of Israel, click on my Profile.

[crystalk]

That is absurd and vicious. The Arabs are descended from Yishmael and the Israelis from Yitzhak.

[Michael2001]

"Dozens of Pashtun names and customs sound Jewish," the Jewish Telegraphic Agency wrote. Researchers link Pashtun and Jewish tribe names such as Afridi (Ephraim), Yusufzai (Joseph), Shinwari (Shimon) and Rabbani (Reuben).

Not to mention Mullah Mohammed Goldstein

[CommiesOut]

Or Usamah bin Disapirinsky.

[loliput]

There is certanly something Talibannish about Isral-firsters.

[veronica]

Isral-firsters...

For someone so hung up on Israel, you seem unable to spell it. Is English your first language? Or are you an Islam-Firster. You don't appear to agree with American foreign policy at all. Are you upset we are going to go after the 'evil axis' now? Is that why you are so grouchy all the time? Are you mad that Bush beat up on the Taliban?

[TransOxus]

It is said that the area where Cain and the Vegans were banished to known as East of Eden is in the vicinity of Kashmir/Afghanistan.