Ten Lost Tribes: Encyclopedia II - Ten Lost Tribes - Varied claims

Ten Lost Tribes - Varied claims

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. (cited on p. 217, Pictorial History of the Jewish People by Nathan Ausubel, 1953).

On December 23, 1649, after Manasseh ben Israel, a noted rabbi of Amsterdam had been told by Montezinus that some of the Lost Tribes were living among the Indians in South America, he wrote to the English Puritan John Dury ...

... 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 ... (ibid, Ausubel)

In the 1600s Manasseh ben Israel petitioned Oliver Cromwell to allow the Jews to return to England. Since 1290, Jews had been prohibited by law from living in England. The reason why Cromwell expressed an interest in the return of the Jews to England is because several other theories abounded at that time 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 Grecian, 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. In the 19th century factions of the Pentecostal church and others who predated Jehovah's Witnesses advocated similar beliefs. A fascinating book concerning the biography of Pastor Charles Taze Russell (founder of the group that became Jehovah's Witnesses), and subtitled An Early American Christian Zionist was written in 1990 by David Horowitz, who for many years led the United Israel World Union.

Ten Lost Tribes - David Horowitz

David Horowitz was the founder of the United Israel World Union and one of eight children of Cantor Aaron and Bertha Horowitz whose family immigrated to the United States in 1914. He first went to the land of present-day Israel in 1924 as an ardent Zionist. He married and moved to Poland in 1927 where he lived with his wife's parents during her pregnancy and played a part in trying to rescue Jews from the Nazis. He moved to the U.S. in 1943 where he became an accredited correspondent to the United Nations and founded the United Israel World Union. The purpose of his organization was to preach a universal Hebraic faith for all humankind based on the Decalogue and the other universal commandments of the Torah. The hallmark of the organization was Isaiah's prescription that:

My house will become a house of prayer for all peoples ...

This is the same verse that Herbert W. Armstrong used for his reason to build the Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena, California, and Armstrong once announced a plan to assist in the building of a Jewish/Christian/Islamic center at Mount Sinai with the blessings of both Egyptian and Israeli leaders.

Ten Lost Tribes - Nathan Ausubel

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
• 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 "the real Jews" and built a rival Temple on Mount Gerizim in the days of Ezra. See article on link.
• Karaites (See article on link).

Ten Lost Tribes - British Israelism

British Israelism (sometimes called Anglo-Israelism) is a complex set of theories, not necessarily compatible with each other, that have in common the idea that the British are the direct lineal descendants of the lost tribes of Israel. The theory is held by a minority of Christians, usually Protestants of British descent.

British Israelism is typically based on the idea that large numbers of the tribes were deported by Sargon, king of Assyria, on the fall of Samaria in 721 BC. Critics of the theory point out, however, that the Assyrian chronicles of the time claim that only a small number of Israelites were deported.

In the 20th century Herbert W. Armstrong compared all of the tribes of Israel to the populations of individual states within the U.S. He would explain that not all American citizens are Californians, but that all Californians are American citizens. He therefore did not distinguish between the Tribe of Judah and the other tribes who appeared to have become "lost" to history. Consequently Armstrong established many links between his Radio Church of God and the present state of Israel, while Stanley Rader, who was a Jew, often served as mentor and always as right hand man to Armstrong. It should also be noted that Armstrong took great pride in his personal relationships with Israeli leaders and he provided students for many years from his own Ambassador Colleges to join students from Hebrew University in archaeological digs in Israel. The work of Armstrong was not unknown to David Horowitz who held the belief that ...

After Armstrong's death in 1986, the World Wide Church of God, changed its format and no longer promoted his ideas and beliefs. Several splinter groups emerged, the most popular being Philadelphia Church of God, under the leadership of Gerald Flurry, continued Armstrong's message. Armstrong on his radio and TV show The World Tomorrow offered a free book called The United States and Britain in Prophecy to his listeners viewers. In this book the Twelve Tribes mystery is explained from Armstrong's perspective. The Philadelphia Church of God, after having succesfully taken legal action against the World Wide Church of God to gain the copyrights for Armstrong's writings, now offers the same publication for free on their TV show called The Key of David, currently running in many US cities, and on the Internet.

Ten Lost Tribes - Later-day Saints movement

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and others teach that remnants of the lost tribes are found among the native American and Polynesian peoples. See 'Israel’s “Other Tribes”', published by the LDS church. If this article is removed, info can be gained using the search engine on the LDS library web site.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Varied claims", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki