India's Jewish Population Through The Ages

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                  

     Celebration at a wedding of Bnei Israel of Jews  in India.  Two days before Yamit Talker-Shefer’s wedding to her husband Elad, in traditional Indian custom her family donned colorful saris and gathered together for the henna ceremony, in which her ring finger was painted red in preparation for the wedding ring to come. Forty-eight hours later, in traditional Jewish custom, she and Elad stood under the chuppah – the Jewish wedding canopy – and recited ancient Hebrew vows before an Israeli rabbi.

While some Indian Jews state that their ancestors arrived in India during the time of the Ancient Kingdom of Judah, others identify themselves as descendants of Ancient Israel's Ten Lost Tribes who arrived earlier.

Actually, the relations of the Hebrew with India goes back in the time of Solomon as told in (I Kings 9:26-8).  "King Solomon made a fleet in Ezion-geber....Hiram (king of Tyre) sent in the fleet his servants, , shipmen who knew the sea, together with Solomon's servants;  they came to Ophir and took gold from there, 420 talents, and brought them to King Solomon."                         

Many areas of the Arabian Peninsula have been proposed as the site of Ophir; the principal alternative locations overseas are East Africa and India.  Earlier in the 19th century Max Müller and other scholars identified Ophir with Abhira, near the Indus River in modern-day state of Gujarat, India. According to Benjamin Walker Ophir is said to have been a town of the Abhira tribe.  Friedrich Max Müller(1823-1900)  was a German-born philologist and Orientalist, who lived and studied in Britain for most of his life. He was one of the founders of the western academic disciplines of Indian studies and religious studies. Müller wrote both scholarly and popular works on the subject of Indology. 

The Jews of Cochin first established themselves in Cranganore in the 6th century. The Portuguese captured it in 1523, afterwards it became the Jewish center.  They were then called the "Black Jews."  When Jews from Turkey and Syria entered their world, they kept apart from these "White Jews" because of the caste system of India.   Then they moved to Cochin by the 16th century. It was a port and former state on the Malabar coast of Southern India. Later, their population was reinforced by Jews from Europe and Syria.  Ex-Marranos, probably from Spain or Portugal (Jews who pretended to be Catholics, then reverted back to Judaism), traveled from London or Amsterdam,  and appeared in many places, including Madras where there was an organized congregation.   The Jews of Cochin suffered during the Portuguese incursions.  Under  the Dutch and later, British rule, they flourished.  While living in Cochin, they preserved their own liturgy for marriages, etc.  About 100 Jews were left in Cochin by 1968 when they clebrated the 400th annibversary of its synagogue in a special service attended by the indian PM, Mrs. Indira Gandhi.  By 1993, there were 25 "White Jews" and 50 "Black Jews" left in Cochin.                     

CALICUT had Jewish communities as well as in other places in India during the Middle Ages.  Although the city's official name is Kozhikode, in English it is sometimes known by its anglicised version, Calicut.  Kozhikode is a town with a long recorded history.  Kozhikode is a coastal city in the south Indian state of Kerala, a southern port. It was a significant spice trade center and is close to Kappad Beach, where Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama landed in 1498.                                                                                   

                     Ruby Meyers(1907-1983) in 1920, The Vamp from the community of Baghdadi Jews in India.  She was born in Pune, Bombay Presidency, British India, and died in her flat in Mumbai,(Bombay), India.  

  Shalom Bollywood; Ruby Myers aka Sulochana, was the first superstar of Indian silent cinema;  India's forgotten history of Jews who made it big in early cinema; Though they were outsiders, Jewish performers found it easy to blend in in Bombay cinema.  Hindi cinema, often known as Bollywood and formerly as Bombay cinema, is the Indian Hindi-language film industry based in Mumbai (Bombay-renamed in 1995). The term is a portmanteau of "Bombay" and "Hollywood".

                                                

The Bene Israel Jews lived in the neighborhood of Bombay-now called Mumbai, a port.  Bene Israel (sons of Israel) claim to be one of the Lost Tribes of Israel.  It is a historic Jewish community in India.  This is in the central Westside of India. Ethnically Indian, their origin is uncertain.  In the 18th century, their Jewish observance was at a low ebb, but they have since returned to a whole-hearted observance of Judaism. European Jews, mainly connected with the Sephardi community of London, settled in Bombay in the 17th century and established a short-lived community in the 18th. In the 19th century, Jews from Baghdad went to Bombay, forming their own community. Bombay's population in 1981 was 3,076.  This was considered the greatest center of Bene Israel.  It is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the second-most populous city in the country after Delhi and the seventh-most populous city in the world with a population of roughly 20 million.  In contrast, New York City has 8,008,278.                                      

Members of India’s Bnei Menashe Jewish community (photo credit: LAURA BEN-DAVID/SHAVEI ISRAEL)  5 women will make aliyah to Israel by New Year of 2021.  

 Some Indian Jews claim descent particularly from Ancient Israel's tribe of Menashe and are referred as the Bnei Menashe. It is estimated that India's Jewish population peaked at around 20,000 in the mid-1940s, and began to rapidly decline due to their emigration to Israel after its creation in 1948.                                  

  There have been 4 Jewish Miss India.  Of these, Miss India,  3,000 lived in Bombay and the rest in 9 other communities. 

Fleur Ezekiel of Bene Israel was chosen as Miss World in 1959. She was a model.  

When the first Miss India beauty pageant took place in 1947, it was no surprise that a stunning Bollywood starlet named Pramila won. She was a natural beauty, with wide, sparkling eyes and a warm smile. She was also a Baghdadi Jew, born Esther Victoria Abraham.

Jews have always been a religious minority in India – currently hovering around 5,000 in a total Indian population of 1.3 billion. But when Pramila accepted the Miss India title at age 31 – while pregnant with her fifth child – she blazed a trail for future Jewesses, starting with her own daughter, Naqi Jahan. Jahan was crowned twenty years after her mother, and was the first to represent India in Australia’s Queen of the Pacific Quest beauty pageant.   They are the only mother and daughter to have both won the Miss India title. Esther Victoria Abraham died on 6 August 2006.

Today's Sassoon family, Rival Iraqi  Jewish clans in Shanghai

Iraqi Jews began to arrive from Baghdad in the early 19th century established Arabic-speaking communities in Bombay, Calcutta.  Some of them, such as the SASSOON family, have attained great prominence. The Sassoon family, known as "Rothschilds of the East" due to the immense wealth they accumulated in finance and trade, is a family of Baghdadi Jewish descent. Originally based in Baghdad, Iraq, they later moved to Bombay, India, and then spread to China, England, and other countries. They numbered about 3,000 in 1948.

European Jews, including German refugees, settled in groups during the later period of British rule.  they have never established any communal organization.               

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has just left India after a six-day official visit during which the two countries heralded a "new era" in ties. BBC Hindi's Zubair Ahmed travelled to Beersheba in Israel to meet a community of Indian-origin Jews who migrated there soon after the nation's creation.

Most Indian Jews have settled in Israel and by 1990, only 5,600 were left in India.  Of these, 3,000 lived in Bombay and the rest in 9 other communities.  Over 70,000 Indian Jews now live in Israel (over 1% of Israel's total population).                 

Let's not forget that Pashtuns also live in India,  particularly in the Rohilkhand region of the state of Uttar Pradesh, and in the states of Gujarat and Rajasthan. We now believe that Pashtos/Pashtuns, at least some of them, are from the 10 lost tribes of Israel, Israelites who were captured and taken away by the Assyrians in 721 BCE.  Since many are living in India, it's been easier to study them for this historical research and DNA studies.  The Pataudis were of Afghan descent, whose ancestors arrived in India in the late 15th century as mercenaries of the Pashtun emperor Bahlul Lodi, during the latter's reign. According to Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, the family are "basically Afghans with a bit of Turkish blood."  The Turks had an empire called The Ottoman Empire.  The Ottoman Empire ruled a large portion of the Middle East and Eastern Europe for over 600 years. It first formed in 1299 and finally dissolved in 1923, becoming the country of Turkey.  They had lost the empire by losing in WWI on  November 11, 1918.  

Resource:

Tanakh, Stone Edition

The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_M%C3%BCller

https://www.indiatoday.in/magazine/leisure/story/20171113-indian-silent-cinema-ruby-myers-jewish-telephone-operator-1077155-2017-11-05

https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-the-rival-iraqi-jewish-clans-who-changed-the-face-of-shanghai-1.8999365

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sassoon_family

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_Myers

https://jewishbubba.blogspot.com/2013/06/four-jewish-beauties-in-indias-beauty.html

Tribes of Manasseh and Ephraim Are To Be Leaders Back To Israel

 Nadene Goldfoot                                       

                 Jacob blessing Joseph's 2 sons, Manasseh and Ephraim 

The two tribes, Manasseh and Ephraim were from the sons of Joseph, and Joseph was the son of Jacob and Rachel, his first love.  Simcha Jacobovici, producer and archaeologist,  just mentioned that it is these 2 tribes who will start of the return of the Lost Tribes to Israel as prophecised on Youtube.  They are one of the 1st claiming to be from the Lost Tribes and have already entered Israel.  

Manasseh was the son of Joseph and Asenath (Gen.41:50-1).  His grandfather, Jacob, conferred on both he and his brother, Ephraim, equal portions of inheritance with his own sons-with their uncles, in the division of Canaan.  The tribe was divide into 7 families, one called Machir and the other 6 claiming kindship with Gilead.  half the tribe, together with those of Reuben and Gad, requested territory in Transjordania, which was granted by Moses on condition that they accompany the remaining tribes in the conquest of the land as scouts preceding the main body.  

This half-tribe received Gilead, Bashan and Argob.  After the conquest of Canaan, the other half received territory in the west of the country around the Valley of Jezreel.  Both these areas were highly fertile.  

Tiglath-Pileser III and King Sargon (reigned from 721 to712 BCE) exiled much of the population from both sections but part remained.  A Jewish population , partly descended from the tribe of Simeon, still existed in the West Manasseh region in the earlier 2nd Temple Period in the 530 BCE days.                                

The tribe of Manasseh has been found to be in NE India.  The Bnei Menashe (Hebrew: בני מנשה‎, "Children of Menasseh") are an ethnolinguistic group in India's Northeastern border states of Manipur and Mizoram. The Chin, Kuki, and Mizo peoples of this particular group claim descent from one of the Lost Tribes of Israel and have adopted the practice of Judaism.   Members of the group include ethnic Chins, Lushais, Kukis, and Mizos. Collectively they are often referred to as Shinlung.        Nagaland also has Konyak tribes who have been headhunters.  70,000 Indian Jews live now in Israel which is over 1% of Israel's total population. (Updated 9/14/2021)

I might add that Afghanistan, Pakistan and India also is the home of the Pashtuns, now believed to be from the 10 Lost Tribes taken away by the Assyrians in 721 BCE.  So it is possible that some made their way to NE India.                                     

 The Chin, Kuki, and Mizo peoples of this particular group claim descent from one of the Lost Tribes of Israel and have adopted the practice of Judaism.  The Chin, Kuki, and Mizo peoples were primarily animists; among their practices was headhunting.  In other words, they were headhunters.  Then they had been converted to Christianity in the 1800's.  My question is how did they evolve into headhunting?  It had to be that an Israelite woman was captured by headhunters and the branch grew from her.  The Konyaks are of Mongoloid in origin. Before the advent of Christianity into Nagaland, the Konyaks were the believers of “Animism” worshipping different objects of nature. About 95% of the population follows the Christian faith now.

One of their tribal leaders reported having a dream that his people's ancient homeland was Israel, and some of the Bnei Menashe began to re-embrace the idea that they were Jews. The Bnei Menashe started studying and practicing Judaism since the 1970s in a desire to return to the religion of their ancestors. The total population of Manipur and Mizoram is more than 3.7 million. The Bnei Menashe are estimated by Shavei Israel to number around 10,000; close to 4,000 have emigrated to Israel. 

When Christian missionaries had encountered the tribe in the late 19th century, they had found similarities between some of their own biblical stories and the Bnei Menashe's mythology. They have no written history but their legends refer to a beloved homeland that they had to leave, called Sinlung/Chinlung. The various tribes speak languages that are branches of indigenous Tibeto-Burman.

Dr. Shalva Weil, a senior researcher and noted anthropologist at Hebrew University, wrote in her paper, Dual Conversion Among the Shinlung of North-East (1965):In a 2004 study Weil says, "although there is no documentary evidence linking the tribal peoples in northeast India with the myth of the lost Israelites, it appears likely that, as with revivalism, the concept was introduced by the missionaries as part of their general millenarian leanings." In the 19th and 20th centuries, Christian missionaries "discovered" lost tribes in far-flung places; their enthusiasm for identifying such peoples as part of the Israelite tribes was related to the desire to speed up the messianic era and bring on the Redemption. Based on his experience in China, for example, Scottish missionary Rev. T.F. Torrance wrote China’s Ancient Israelites (1937), expounding a theory that the Qiang people were Lost Israelites. This theory has not been supported by any more rigorous studies.                                                

In 2003–2004 DNA testing of several hundred men of this group did not provide conclusive evidence of Middle Eastern ancestry. A Kolkata study in 2005 suggested that a small number of women sampled may have some Middle Eastern ancestry, but this may also have resulted from intermarriage during the thousands of years of migration of Jewish peoples. In the early 21st century, Israel halted immigration by the Bnei Menashe; after a change in government, the immigration was allowed again. The chief rabbi of Israel ruled in 2005 that the Bnei Menashe were recognized as part of a lost tribe. After undergoing the process for formal conversion, they will be allowed aliyah (immigration).

By 2005, some 800 converts had settled in Israel, helped by an organization called Shavei Israel, a Jerusalem-based group that attempts to give help and succor to “lost Jews” seeking to return to the Jewish people. For the most part the Shinlung do not see themselves as converts in the usual sense of the term: like other such groups – one might cite the Bene Ephraim Telugu-speaking Jews of Andhra Pradesh who believe themselves to be descended from the Tribe of Ephraim – they believe that they are historically of Jewish descent. This controversial claim has found little support among scholars, although a gifted Israeli essayist and translator – Hillel Halkin – took up their cause in a colorful account published in 2002. He was joined in 2005 by the Sephardi chief rabbi of Israel, Shlomo Amar, who decided to formally recognize the Bene Menashe as “descendants of Israel” and agreed to dispatch a beit din from Israel to northeast India to convert them.     

The Afridis, Yusufzais and other Pashtuns of Afghanistan and Pakistan have also been alleged to be the descendants of the lost Jewish tribes such as the Efraim. However, DNA and other research towards validating such claims has been inconclusive . 

The Bene Israel Jewish community from West India is a unique population whose history before the 18th century remains largely unknown. Bene Israel members consider themselves as descendants of Jews, yet the identity of Jewish ancestors and their arrival time to India are unknown, with speculations on arrival time varying between the 8th century BCE and the 6th century CE. 

Putting together the results from all analyses point to Bene Israel being an admixed population with both Jewish and Indian ancestry, with the genetic contribution of each of these ancestral populations being substantial. The admixture took place in the last millennium, about 19–33 generations ago. It involved Middle-Eastern Jews and was sex-biased, with more male Jewish and local female contribution. It was followed by a population bottleneck and high endogamy, which can lead to increased prevalence of recessive diseases in this population. One asserts that the community originated in one of the Jewish communities in the Middle East. According to the researchers, they arrived in India 19 to 33 generations ago — 600 to 1,000 years ago — much later than estimates of community members. Over 70,000 members of the Bene Israel community live in Israel today, making it the largest Indian Jewish group in the world.

      Below are Bnei Ephraimites of India.                               

In the southern part of India has been found the Ephraimites.  

 Bene-Ephraim of Andhra Pradesh (India), whose unique circumstances provide an interesting new perspective on theoretical discussion about legitimization of identities.

The community of Bene-Ephraim (or 'Telugu Jews') was established in the late 1980s in the Guntur District of Andhra Pradesh by a group of Christianised Madiga untouchables who declared that they belonged to one of the Lost Tribes of Israel. In 1992 the community established a synagogue and introduced a number of Jewish rites into their practice. Shortly afterwards they started seeking recognition by the State of Israel and among the Jewish communities in the West. Though they have not been 'recognised' by any of Israeli officials the community have established contacts with Amishav and Kulanu organizations in Israel and the USA respectively, which unite those interested in finding and assisting communities that are 'rediscovering' their Jewish origin. Through this connection Bene-Ephraim have had several visits from rabbis and other interested individuals who have been helping them to establish practices of more mainstream Judaism.                                             

 These people are also Bnei Ephraim in India.  Indian historian says genetic link exists between members of his clan and Lost Tribe.  Dr. Navras Jaat Aafreedi, an Indian historian, says he may have found a genetic link between members of his clan in northern India, the now-Muslim Afridi Pathans, and one of the Ten Lost Tribes. "There were those who looked at this research as part of a big Zionist conspiracy against Islam," said Aafreedi, who is currently conducting research at Tel Aviv University into possible Israelite descent among certain Muslim Indian groups. "They felt I was trying to deprive Islam of its bravest followers, the Pathans, by converting them to Judaism. They felt that my convincing them of their Jewish heritage was just another form of conversion." According to Aafreedi's study, which was published as an e-book, about 650 out of the 1,500 members of the Afridi Pathan clan in Malihabad, India, may possess genetic material shared by nearly 40 percent of Jews worldwide. If confirmed, the findings would support the clan's connection to the tribe of Ephraim, Aafreedi said. A related Indian Pathan group numbering some 800 people was not tested for the project

The Bene Ephraim circumcise their children; celebrate all Jewish holidays, including Purim and Chanukah, which postdate their exile from Israel; keep mezuzot in their homes; teach their children Hebrew and give them Hebrew names.  They’re landless farmers who work for others but who keep Shabbat as a day of rest. “That cuts into their incomes,” which average only $1.40 per day, she said. They live in clay-walled houses with thatched roofs and no running water, though there is intermittent electrical service.  Despite their adherence to Jewish life-cycle events, they are willing to undergo conversion to assure their link to the wider Jewish world, although that is problematic in India, which has laws against missionaries.           

      Deceased Pashto poet, Sahil Afridi, was simplicity, humbleness, personified

Yet the tribe of Afridi in Afghanistan,  are more likely to be from Ephraim.  The Afridi (Pashto: اپريدی، افریدی‎; also spelled Apridi) are a tribe of Pashtuns. Their traditional homeland is in Khyber and Darra Adam Khel in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.  That's known to be the most dangerous area. Most Afridis speak a northern variety of Pashto known as Afridi Pashto.

All Afridis follow Islam Sunni by sect. Their conversion to Islam is attributed to Sultan (Emperor) Mahmud of Ghazni by Ibbetson and Haroon Rashid.  The Muslim conquests of Afghanistan began during the Muslim conquest of Persia as the Arab Muslims migrated eastwards to Khorasan, Sistan and Transoxiana.

 The tribe of Ephraim was the most northern tribe of Israel.  During the period of Judges, before King Saul, Ephraim claimed priority among the tribes, partly because their religious center was situated at Shiloh in its territory.  The secession of the northern tribes after Solomon's death centered on the tribe of Ephraim, to which Jeroboam, the 1st king of the northern kingdom of Israel, belonged.  The prophets later spoke of the House of Judah and the House of Ephraim., as representing the 2 branches of the Hebrew people. 

Resource:

https://www.jpost.com/jewish-world/jewish-features/researcher-claims-proof-of-tribe-of-ephraim-in-india

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=057TwFlGz10---making assumption, claim is not proven about tribe of Kuki in NE india in Manipur

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bnei_Menashe#:~:text=The%20Bnei%20Menashe%20(Hebrew%3A%20%D7%91%D7%A0%D7%99,adopted%20the%20practice%20of%20Judaism.

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/bene-menashe

The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia

https://www.cjnews.com/news/lost-tribe-israel-found-southern-india

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afridi_Pashto

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afridi

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0152056        DNA of India/Jews

Plos one

https://thediplomat.com/2018/04/the-last-headhunters-of-nagaland/

https://www.boredpanda.com/the-last-living-head-hunters-from-nagaland-noth-east-india/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic

https://mon.nic.in/culture-heritage/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_India#:~:text=Over%2070%2C000%20Indian%20Jews%20now,%25%20of%20Israel's%20total%20population).

Continued Mourning For Our Ten Lost Tribes Of 8th Century BCE

Nadene Goldfoot                                                  

 

At the last census that Moses took, Judah had 76, 500 people in his tribe, 

more than the others.  Simeon was the smallest tribe with 22, 200.  Joshua, the Exodus leader after Moses died,  directed the tribes on the land as to where they should live.  

Moses was from the tribe of Judah.  Joshua was from the tribe of  Ephraim of 32,500. 

Jews have mourned over the loss of our 2nd Temple and have a fast day of remembrance for it  The other mourning we continue to have has been for our Ten Lost Tribes of  Reuben,Simeon, Issachar, Zebulun, Gad, Asher, Dan Naphtali, Joseph and Benjamin.  The southern tribes of Levi and Judah were spared from the Assyrian attack in 721 BCE.  Our more northern 10 tribes of the 12 brothers had become captives and were taken from us.  We have never forgotten them, for at the end of times, we are to be together again.

I must explain.  Jacob, the son of Isaac, who was the son of Abraham, ultimately had 4 wives.  He married Leah first who bore Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Juah, Issachar, Zebulun and his only daughter, Dinah.  He then was able to marry his true love, Leah's sister, Rachel who bore Joseph and Benjamin.  He married Leah's handmaid Zilpah who bore  Gad and Asher.  Then he married Rachel's handmaid, Bilhah who bore Dan and Naphtali.  These 12 sons became the fathers of the 12 tribes of our history.  The  remaining tribe of Judah had always been the largest of the 12, and the remaining tribal people called themselves the Jewish people, of which we Jews are.  This is our history.  In the end, some Benjaminites and a few of the others were living in Judah at the time who survived the attack.     

Travelers, adventurers and scholars have set out looking for the Sambatyon River which has become a myth by now because beyond this river was said that the Ten Tribes of Israel lived who were exiled by the Assyrians in the 8th century BCE.  They must be living beyond this mighty river.  This river would not have been the Jordan River that divided their land that they were familiar with.  It must have been the faint memories and stories of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers of Mesopotamia.    Or maybe they had known about the "Indus" River. The Indus River is one of the main rivers of the Indo-Gangetic Plain in the Indian subcontinent. It flows through China, India, and Pakistan.    

According to the legend, the 10 tribes would have returned at once to the Holy Land following their exile if they could, but G-d had encircled them with this river.  It was said that the river, this great and terrible river seethed with wild rapids, churning great rocks and billowed up to the heavens.  It was only on the Sabbath, however, that the river rested from its fury, but our 10 Tribes couldn't cross because of their great piety and their reverence for the Day of Rest as this even happened after being with Moses on the 40 year Exodus, and they were well-schooled in followed the Laws of Moses from G-d.

                                                     

Our history of the 10 Tribes has gone on since the 8th century BCE to the 17th century CE; 27 centuries of aching for their lost cousins.  That ache has surfaced once again, especially since the re-birth lately of Israel on May 14, 1948 in remembrance of the expectation of being united again at the end of times. 

                                              

               A false messiah;  Rabbi Shabbatai Tzevi (1626-1676) born in Smyra, attracted to Kabbalah in his youth, had manic-depressive traits. A heavenly voice told him he would redeem Israel.  When in Israel in 1665 and was hailed the messiah by Nathan of Gaza, but then excommunicated by the rabbis of Jerusalem, the Harvard of Rabbinical education.  

During the 17th century CE Jews experienced a false messiah, Shabbetai Zevi who had  his own prophet, Nathan of Gaza.  Rumors were then flying that the armies of the 10 Tribes were advancing from the desert to fight the Turks.  There were other rumors that they were about to conquer Mecca.  The stories were so persistent that in 1665, the Moslems of Tunis actually cancelled their pilgrimage to their  holy city.   Other stories abounded, announcing the arrival of the legions of the Tribes or describing their kingdom somewhere in the hinterlands of Asia or Africa that have surfaced regularly since the Middle Ages.  They were heard about in the Middle East and Europe in letters written by Jews, in reports of Christian diplomats, or in occasional publications.  These legends were passed on through the generations.  In the 16th and 17th centuries, these legends were spreading messianic propaganda in the Jewish world, and also played into the political interests of the Christian European states in their struggle against the Ottoman Empire.  

The "New World" was being explored and "scientific theories began to emerge where scholars and missionaries tried to identify various tribes with the Ten Lost Tribes.  They looked at their customs to Biblical traditions. Anglo-American Protestant clergymen and scholars supported this search primarily and this trend continued into the 20th century.

Modern anthropologists have looked into the effects of the Lost Tribes and their theories upon different native groups around the world and how they are serving a political function.  This would explain the Maori Jews of New Zealand, the Ashanti Jews of West Africa, and others like them.  These were oppressed groups who were exposed to missionary activity who could identify with the 10 Lost Tribes. 

                                               

 Today is another story.  We have identified the Pashtuns of Afghanistan, Pakistan and India as some of the Lost Tribes of Israel.  A few have even visited Israel.  This is because we have had individuals and organizations continuing in the search for the Ten Lost Tribes.  At the same time, several groups in South America, Asia and Africa have identified themselves as descendants of these tribes. declaring their commitment to link their fate with the Jewish people and the State of Israel.   However, the Pashtuns, and they number greatly, continue to be content as Muslims.  

Today we have the means of identification with DNA testing.  Pashtuns have stated that they know who they are and don't need testing, but we need this verification.  So many people have declared they were among the lost 10, such as some of the British royal family which brings doubt.  

Pakistan was used for testing.  Pakistan covers a key geographic area in human history, being both part of the Indus River region that acted as one of the cradles of civilization and as a link between Western Eurasia and Eastern Asia. This region is inhabited by a number of distinct ethnic groups, the largest being the Punjabi, Pathan (Pakhtuns), Sindhi, and Baloch. 

 Afghanistan was also used in another study.  The present study addresses this lacuna by analyzing 190 Pathan males from Afghanistan using high-resolution Y-chromosome binary markers. In addition, haplotype diversity for its most common lineages (haplogroups R1a1a*-M198 and L3-M357) was estimated using a set of 15 Y-specific STR loci. The observed haplogroup distribution suggests some degree of genetic isolation of the northern population, likely due to the Hindu Kush mountain range separating it from the southern Afghans who have had greater contact with neighboring Pathans from Pakistan and migrations from the Indian subcontinent. Our study demonstrates genetic similarities between Pathans from Afghanistan and Pakistan, both of which are characterized by the predominance of haplogroup R1a1a*-M198 (>50%) and the sharing of the same modal haplotype. Furthermore, the high frequencies of R1a1a-M198 and the presence of G2c-M377 chromosomes in Pathans might represent phylogenetic signals from Khazars, a common link between Pathans and Ashkenazi groups, whereas the absence of E1b1b1a2-V13 lineage does not support their professed Greek ancestry.  

 Other returnees of Lost Tribes have been India's Bnei Menashe when 162 entered to join the 1,700 already in Israel who had been arriving over the past 15 years while there are 7,000 more wanting to immigrate to Israel.  You Tube has many segments showing this group.  

                                                        

 69 people from Ethiopia also arrived at about the same time.  They, too, have been coming in installments as soon as they can leave Ethiopia.  There are many other groups from other corners of the world who have already entered Israel.  We've been seeing THE RETURN.   

Resource: 

Letters From Beyond the Sambatyon-the myth of the ten lost tribes-edited by Simcha Shtull-Trauring

https://bmcgenomics.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12864-015-1290-1

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3449065

https://jewishbubba.blogspot.com/2015/08/pashtuns-and-jewish-redemption.html/

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-ten-lost-tribes

https://jewishbubba.blogspot.com/2018/10/life-for-israelites-from-assyrian-days.html

https://jewishbubba.blogspot.com/2015/08/pashtuns-and-jewish-redemption.html

https://jewishbubba.blogspot.com/2019/01/possible-connection-in-dna-of-pashtuns.html

https://jewishbubba.blogspot.com/2019/01/jews-and-pashtuns-sons-of-israels.html

Tanakh (Old Testament) Stone Edition