The Continued Frantic Search for the 10 Lost Tribes of Israel

Nadene Goldfoot                                                 

                         James Adair with  American Indians

The Old Testament must have been popular reading once upon a time in the 17th and 18th centuries, for people born then investigated whether the American Indians were the lost tribes of Judah.   Their conclusions were both a Yes and a No.  No one could prove either way, so it became a hot topic.  James Adair, an Irish trader who lived among the Cherokees for 40 years, decided that the Indians were one of the lost tribes and wrote 70,000 words on the subject at a time when printed words were dear.  

                                                                              

                                                          Cherokee Indians

The supposed connection between the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel and the Native American nations of North America gained support during the 18th century with the increase of European exploration of the continent. James Adair (1709-1783), was one of the earliest to believe in a connection between the Ten Lost Tribes and the various Indian tribes of North America, a theory that he formulated in his History of the American Indians (London, 1775).  At the same period, this theory also received the support by Charles Beaty, a missionary to the territories west of the Allegheny Mountains, who detailed it in his Journal of a Two Months Tour with a View of Promoting Religion among the Frontier Inhabitants of Pennsylvania, and of Introducing Christianity among the Indians to the Westward of the Allegheny Mountains, (London, 1768).              

His evidence were their division into tribes; their language and dialects;  their festivals;  feasts, and religious rites;  their absolutions and anointings;  their laws of uncleanness;  their avoidance of unclean things;  their practices of marriage, divorce, and punishment for adultery; and  their ornaments.  

Others who held similar view like Adair were Gregorio Garcia in his Origen de las Indios de el Nuevo Mundo in 1607; Bartolome de las Casas, Thomas Thorowgood in his "Jewes in America" in 1650 and 1660, John Eliot in his Conjectures, Manasseh ben Israel, Cotton Mather, Roger Williams, William Penn, Charles Beatty in The Journal of Two-Months Tour in 1768.                                                           

The Indian tribe most likely thought of as one of the Lost Tribes was the Cherokee because they were inheritors of a dignity beyond their rather simple means and even referred to themselves as the "principal people."  their lands were the center of the Earth in their history stories.  All else radiated outward from there.  

Naturalist and social historian, William Bartram, reported on them.  "The Cherokees in their disposition and manner are grave and steady;  dignified and circumspect in their deportment;  rather slow and reserved in conversation; yet frank, cheerful and humane;  tenacious and determined in their councils, honest, just and liberal, and are ready always to defend their territory and maintain their rights.  

They were a  clean people, when compared to the white English, German, and Scots-Irish settlers drifting in, infiltrating their territory, most of whom were satisfied to bathe in autumn and not again till spring.  The Indians "went to water" often, considering water, the sun, and fire to be 3 holy gifts of the Great Spirit.  

The color of their skin was a copper color and they were proud of it, referring to Europeans as "ugly whites.".  They happened to be lighter than their Indian neighbors, the Creeks, Choctaws and Iroquois.  They were lithe, tall, erect, and without noticeable deformities.  Their spoken language was musical and was punctuated by guttural breathy breaks.  The men enjoyed ball games, hunting and warfare. Warfare was their favorite activity and occupied much of each winter.  

The discovery of the American continent with its various populations generated among the Jews and the Christians alike a number of speculations about the supposed Israelite origin of the American Indians. The Spanish bishop Bartolomeo de Las Casas (1484-1566), a fervent defender of the rights of the native nations of the Americas, forwarded a theory according to which the American Indians were descendants from the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. The same idea was advanced by some English missionaries. Thomas Thorowgood is his book Jewes in America, or Probabilities that the Americans are of the Race (London, 1650) strongly supported the idea of relating the American Indians to the ancient Israelites. Although Thorowgood’s theory was disputed soon after its publication, among others by members of the clergy, it nevertheless did not lose its attractiveness for other seekers of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel who continued to raise new ideas and speculations in support of the Israelite origin of all or part of Native American nations in both the Northern and Southern American continents.

                                                        

David Reubeni, a 16th century Jewish adventurer, managed to be received by Emperor Charles V in Regensburg along with the false messiah Solomon Molcho (1500-1532), and claimed to represent a relative of King Joseph who ruled over the tribes of Reuben, Gad and half Manasseh. Molkho was born in Portugal as a Marrano and became a royal notary.  His imagination was fired up after meeting with Dqavid Reubeni in 1525 and he had himself circumcised and made his way to the Levant where he became immersed in Kabbalistic study.  Going to Italy, he made a profound impression on Pope Clement VII, who welcomed him in the Vatican and protected him from the Inquisition..  He came to consider himself the messiah.  The inquisition finall got him and he was burned at the stake.  

                                       

                                      Abraham ben Mordechai Farissol

David Reubeni eventually died in a Spanish prison in 1538, but his extraordinary story prompted Abraham ben Mordechai Farissol (c.1451-c.1525), the first Jewish author to mention the newly discovered American continent, to dedicate an entire chapter of his tractate to the subject of the Ten Lost Tribes – (Igeret Orhot Olam, Venice, 1586).

 R. Manasseh ben Israel of Amsterdam (1604-1657) in his book Mikve Israel (Hope of Israel, London, 1652) brings the testimony of the Portuguese crypto-Jew, Aaron Levi (known as Antonio de Montezinos), who claimed to have encountered during his travels to South America (Ecuador, Peru, Colombia, Venezuela) Indian tribes practicing some Jewish rituals and who allegedly were descendants of the tribes of Reuben and Levi. Manasseh ben Israel used the legend of the lost tribes in pleading successfully for the admission of Jews into England during Oliver Cromwell’s regime.  Remember, Jews of England were banished for 365 years from 1290 to 1655.                                    

Joseph Israel (1818-1864), a Romanian-born Jewish adventurer and great admirer of Benjamin of Tudela to the extent that he changed his name to Benjamin the Second;  Joseph Israel traveled between 1845 to 1859, from Istanbul, Turkey, to Egypt, Syria, Land of Israel, Kurdistan, Mesopotamia, Persia, Afghanistan, India, and after 1859 to North America, searching and inquiring everywhere for the Ten Lost Tribes. Joseph Israel met various Jewish communities and collected valuable information about their way of life and traditions. Among the Jewish communities of Asia, he met of the Bene Israel in India who in Israel’s opinion were descendants of of the Ten Tribes.                                 

           Rabbi Pinsk leaving Palestine 

Jewish travelers from the Land of Israel that set out in search of the Ten Lost Tribes in the 19th century include Rabbi Baruch of Pinsk, who was murdered in Yemen having left Safed in 1830; Isaac son of Chaim Baruch Halevi (d. 1886) who traveled from Tiberias to India hoping to find the Sambatyon river; Ezekiel Asche, a German-born physician who left Jerusalem in 1848 and disappeared in Ethiopia, having traveled through Egypt and Yemen; and Rabbi Moshe Yaffe of Hebron who disappeared during his second visit to India in 1848.

                                                             

Moses ben Isaac Edrehi (1774-c.1842), a Moroccan-born rabbi and kabbalist who lived for many years in Amsterdam and London and eventually immigrated to the Land of Israel is the author of two works dealing with the quest for the Ten Lost Tribes. Ma’aseh Nissim (originally published in Hebrew and German in Amsterdam in 1809), is a mythical description of the Sambatyon river who was later published in London in 1834, along with An historical account of the ten tribes, settled beyond the river Sambatyon in the East with many other curious matters relating to the state of the Israelites in various parts of the world, published in London in 1836.

The quest for the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel has been conducted by Jews, Christians and Muslims, in practically every corner of the earth. As a matter of fact during the last centuries this search turned into a theme that has reoccurred occasionally with many Christian travelers, missionaries, authors, and explorers belonging to the Roman Catholic Church as well as to various Protestant denominations. Jewish motifs and beliefs were adopted by non-Jews while Jews accepted some concepts and ideas developed by non-Jewish seekers of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel.

                                                      

One interesting feature is that there are Jews with the Y haplotype of Q.  In fact, my father's line is QBZ67, a very Jewish line.  There are native American and South American Indians that also are of the Q haplogroup, but one that we evidently branched off of many years ago.  The Qs had  originated in Siberia, Mongolia and parts of Turkey thousands of years ago.  Starting the Paleo-Indians period, a migration to the Americas across the Bering Strait (Beringia) by a small population carrying the Q-M242 mutation took place. A member of this initial population underwent a mutation, which defines its descendant population, known by the Q-M3 (SNP) mutation. These descendants migrated all over the Americas.

Haplogroup R1 (Y-DNA) is the second most predominant Y haplotype found among indigenous Amerindians after Q (Y-DNA).

Update: 3pm: Q-M242 originated in Asia (Altai regions), and is widely distributed across it. Q-M242 is found in Russia, Siberia (Kets, Selkups, Siberian Yupik people, Nivkhs, Chukchi people, Yukaghirs, Tuvans, Altai people, Koryaks, etc.), Mongolia, China, Uyghurs,^] Tibet, Korea, Japan, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and so on. (For details, see below.)

Now we have found many of the lost Tribe who are the Pashtuns of Afghanistan, Pakistan an parts of India.  The check out  with cultural facts as well as DNA.  A few are even of the Y haplotype of Q  that match my brother distantly.  

Reference:

TRAIL OF TEARS, The rise and fall of the Cherokee Nation by John Ehle

https://www.anumuseum.org.il/the-myth-of-the-ten-lost-tribes-article/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_term=lost+tribes&utm_campaign=g&device=c&gclid=Cj0KCQjw7MGJBhD-ARIsAMZ0eeuwrElE-znIO4-hn95mLsmy-r8lqJiuL977DzQqrFcNnlGQKTDJs_EaArvpEALw_wcB

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

A Transplanted People: Ancient Northern Israelites

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                

    The attack of King Sargon II of Assyria on the Northern 10 tribes of Israelites-721 BCE

It was the practice in ancient days of getting rid of an undesirable population and exchanging them with  one with better possibilities.  So was the thinking of the Assyrians in 721 BCE.  They had attacked the northern 10 tribes of the Israelite empire and had taken the young and virile population away who could bear up on the trek back to Assyria.  They most likely left the older population who were past the age of child bearing and who would never hold up on such a distance.   Then they brought deportees from other conquered territories to Samaria to take their place. Excavations at Tel Hadid, near Lod in Israel, have unearthed material remains that contribute to our understanding of these transformative years.    So for almost 200 years, Samaria was populated by foreigners exported by the Assyrians.                       

                               743 BCE Urartu: Since the beginning of history the Anatolian Peninsula has been the home of ancient civilizations .Hittites, Urartus, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Seljukides and Ottomans left precious remains in recent Turkey. Ancient waterworks are distributed all over the Anatolian Peninsula making it and neighbouring countries an open-air museum with respect to.water history.  

    They could have been the neighboring kingdoms like Urartu and Elam who were often making incursions into Assyrian territory, a professional army was also required for national defense.  That would be good reason to rid themselves of this people and exchange them for the Israelites.  Elam was an ancient state east of Babylonia, the modern Khuzistan:  capital : Susa, the Shushan of the book of Esther.  The Elamites, as several other non-Semitic peoples, are classed by the Bible as children of Shem.  They had been defeated by Abraham.    Urartu was an early first millennium BC kingdom located in the Armenian highlands. Thanks to its animosity with Assyria, it had a militaristic society and is thought to be the first kingdom to convert from bronze to iron weaponry leading Assyria to quickly follow suit.  The Palestinians of Samaria could be the descendants of such people.                                                         

The Northern tribes had broken away from Judea and Benjamin by virtue of geography;  they were further away from Jerusalem, their center of religious affairs.  Israel was more into business, making money, dealing with other countries than the south was.  They became competitors with the south, creating their own religious center and using some of the Cohens in their tribes to officiate in these new centers.

 It was Assyria's King Shalmaneser V's siege of Samaria and its capture in 721 BCE by Sargon, his successor who were the kidnappers of the Israelites.                                                                            

Sargon seized the throne on the death of Shalmaneser III during the siege of Samaria (northern Israel)  which he brought to a successful conclusion, exiling many of the people.  In 720 BCE, the next year,  he defeated a military alliances which included the remnants of the Israelites of Samaria. He was assassinated and was succeeded by Sennacherib.    

The House of Shalmaneser had fought against an alliance of Damascus, Hamath, and Israel headed by King Ahab of Israel, son of Omri (876-853 BCE) husband of Jezebel, daughter of the king of Sidon.  It was she who had introduced the worship of Baal into Israel, a real no no.  The Shalmaneser kings were against other peoples at Karkar in Syria in 854 and 853 BCE earlier, but had returned home unsuccessful.  Shalmaneser tried again later and this time ravaged the territory of Hamatha, and on his own testimony, received tribute from King Jehu of Israel (842-814 BCE). 

                                        Jehu being anointed as King of Israel 

It was Jehu who killed the royal family including the queen-mother , Jezebel as well as the priests of Baal.  

                                                   

    (the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser shows Jehu paying tribute)

However, he was unsuccessful in his wars with Aram (Syria) and paid tribute to Shalmanaeser III of Assyria to get his protection.  On repelling the Assyrian threat, Hazael of Aram (Syria) deprived Jehu of much of his territory.  The dynasty of Jehu continued to reign for the next 100 years.  

 The next Shalmaneser IV reigned from 728 to 722 BCE and fought against Sidon, Tyre, and Acre. 

 King Hoshea,(732-724 BCE) last king of Israel, revolted against Shalmaneser but fell into his hands. He had become king with Assyrian help, too. His kingdom had been a small one, confined to the surroundings of Mt. Ephraim.  Finally he had reached the boiling point with Assyria and had rebelled and was then put in prison by Shalmaneser who then besieged and captured Samaria.   

 Shalmaneser V died during the siege of Samaria.   

Hosea, a prophet of Israel in 726 BCE threw off the yoke of Israel's exile but comforted it with visions of restoration after the people's repentance.  The way he saw their defection from southern Israel and their more serious observances of the Mosaic law was compared to a wife's marital unfaithfulness.                                 

 Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon of the land of Shinar, also known as the Kasdim (Chaldees) was the next king and conquered Judah.  

Babylon was the land that Abraham and his father, Terah, had left.  They had been living in Ur of the Chaldees, a little south of Babylon.  This king had inherited the Assyrian Empire, and from 605 to 562 BCE had conquered all the lands from the Euphrates River to the Egyptian frontier, including Judah.   In 597 BCE, after Judah revolted, he dispatched contingents which captured Jerusalem, replaced the young king Jehoiachin with his own nominee, Zedekiah, and exiled 8,000 of the local aristocracy to Babylon. They would return in 586 BCE.   

The Judeans of Babylon were able to remain in contact with the Judeans of Jerusalem and even supplied some of their leaders such as Hillel.   Babylonia had overwhelmed this remaining Judean population with their large army.                 

                        King Cyrus II who died in 529 BCE

The Israelites would return to Jerusalem in 538 BCE, in fact sent back by the king Cyrus of Persia, who overran the Babylonian empire, which included Judah  and rebuilt their Temple which Nebuchadnezzar had destroyed.  The total years of exile were about 70 years.  The Judeans were so grateful that they thought of Cyrus as a Divine agent. 

                                           

    There had been Israelites who were not exiled that had remained in Judah.  They had been under the rule of Gedaliah.  The story of Gedaliah represents a major turning point in our nation’s history.   If we dig a bit deeper, we may discover another very well known story lurking just beneath the surface, that carries a critical and much needed message for our day and age.  Gedalia had been the appointed governor of Judah by the Babylonians and was of a noble Jewish family.                                          

He had set up his office in Mizpah but soon was murdered by the commander, Ishmael ben Nethaniah and his followers who were apparently planning a revolt against Babylon in concert with the neighboring powers.  After the murder, Gedaliah's supporters fled to Egypt.  Ishmael was a military officer and now murderer, so he fled to Baalis, king of the Ammonites, who had for political reasons incited him to kill Gedaliah.  After the murder, Ishmael endeavored to take the remnants of the Jewish community to Ammon, but was prevented by Jonathan ben Kareah. (Jer . 40-1).  Before him, as the representative of the government, appeared the Israelitish generals Ishmael b. Nethaniah, Johanan and Jonathan, the sons of Kareah, and others.

A fast is held on the day after his assassination which destroyed any hope of holding their particular Jewish community together in Judah after the Babylonian conquest.  

The deportees taken to Mesopotamia (Babylon) were mostly peasants and craftsmen.  They had kept their religious identity.  When they returned, they were met by descendants of their own past people plus newcomers not familiar with their ways at all.  However, 70 years had past.  

Resource:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt13552578/

https://www.worldhistory.org/Assyrian_Warfare/

https://www.alephbeta.org/playlist/hidden-meaning-behind-tzom-gedaliah

https://www.thetorah.com/article/assyrian-deportation-and-resettlement-the-story-of-samaria

Aaron's Descendants, a Homeless People

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                

                  Aaron and Moses with the Pharaoh of Egypt, talking him into freeing the slaves

Aaron, brother of Moses,  was the father of the most respected and intelligent of the Jewish people, yet they were not given land or home to call their own.  Aaron and Moses belonged to the tribe of Levi, who was the 3rd son of of Jacob and Leah.  Levi was not the best son out of the 6 boys and 1 girl that they had, but a caused trouble when over-reacting to his sister's rapist.                                              

 Levi and his older brother, Simeon, the 2nd son, avenged the dishonoring of his sister, Dinah.  She had  been raped by Shechem, the prince of the region.  Her 2 brothers annihilated the men of the town of Shechem (today's Nablus, an Arab town) (Gen.34). Dinah was abducted and raped near the city of Shechem, by Shechem, son of Hamor the Hivite (the Hivites were a Canaanitish people). Some of the Hivites lived in Northern Canaan, near Mt. Hermon (Josh.11:3). Hamor offered that Shechem and Dinah marry, but  they could not accept that offer.  

Some scholars believe that this indicated the beginning of the conquest of Canaan by the Israelite tribes.  When Jacob found out what his sons had done, an act that occurred shortly after they had arrived in Shechem and were actually new immigrants there, he realized what a  terrible position they were now in. Jacob had believed that at last he would find tranquility in Canaan, but his family had to experience this moral outrage on his own daughter from its beginning. They could not tolerate what others might consider commonplace such as a rape.   On Jacob's deathbed, he forecast that Levi's  descendants would be scattered throughout Israel. 

Levi married Milkah, whose father was Aram, the Syrian, and they had Jochabed, a female, and Gershon, Kohath, and Merari, 

Jochabed married Amram (son of Kohath), her nephew , and they were the parents of Mirium, Aaron and Moses. 

 Aaron married Elisheba, and their children were Nadab and Abihu, who when were young Cohens, ascended Mt. Sinai to behold the Divine revelation (Exod.24:1-11) but later sacrificed strange fire on the altar, and, in punishment, were mortally struck by fire from before the Lord. (Lev. 10:1-3).    Other children of Aaron were Eleazar who followed his father in being the Cohen Gadol, and Ithamar. 

                                                                     

Aaron's line would provide the people following Moses a High Priest, a Kohen gadol. The principle function of the High Priest was the performance of the  service in the Temple. The process, described in the book of Leviticus, requires the High Priest to bathe himself and dress in special linen garments to attain atonement for the people of Israel. Yom Kippur was also the one day of the year when the High Priest was permitted to enter the Holy of Holies, the Temple’s innermost sanctum, where he sprinkled the blood of sacrificial animals. 

Eleazar was the 3rd son and successor of Aaron.  the high priests of the house of Zadok were descended from Eleazar.  The age a Levite entered the priesthood was 30 years of age.  The high priest was the presiding officer of the Sanhedrin. In the post-Maccabean period the high priest was looked upon as exercising in all things, political, legal, and sacerdotal, the supreme authority, shows it to be almost certain that the presidency of the Sanhedrin was vested in the high priest.

Ithamar was a priest or Cohen.  together with his brother, Eleazar, he succeeded his father, Aaron in the priestly office.                    

                                                      A Cohen with a Levite

Abiathar was the son of Abimelech, the high priest at Nob.  Abimelech descended from Aaron's son, Ithamar and the High Priest of Israel who was  Eli.

There was also an Abimelech who was the illegitimate son of Gideon,of the tribe of Manasseh, and  a judge of Israel for 40 years. Gideon had defeated the Midianites near Ein Harod using a group of picked volunteers, and then was offered the kingship, but refused out of loyalty to the principle that G-d is king of Israel.   

In an attempt to establish a monarchy in Israel in the 12th century BCE, Abimelech   killed all of his 70 brothers except Jotham, his youngest brother.  He ruled for 3 years in Shechem, largely with the support of the chiefs of that city, and was killed in the ensuing revolt.  Jotham uttered a parable from Mt. Gerizim, rebuking the people of Shechem for electing Abimelech as king.  He must have been named for the high priest but could not have been the high priest at Nob.                                 

Eli was the High priest at the shrine of Shiloh and one of the last Judges in the 11th century BCE.  He was mentor of Samuel, the prophet.  He succeeded to the high priesthood at the age of 58 and died 40 years later as a result of falling from his chair on hearing of the Philistine capture of the Ark.  His family was subsequently deprived of the high priesthood, the Bible ascribing this to the immoral conduct of his sons, Hophni and Phinehas, who were priests at Shiloh.  Their evil behavior and deaths came in battle at the hands of the Philistines (I Sam. 1-4).                                              

Nob  was a priestly city, probably situated near Jerusalem on Mt. Scopus.  After the destruction of the tabernacle at Shiloh, the priests of the sons of Eli built a high-place in  Northern Israel  where they officiated.  As a punishment for the assistance given to the fugitive David, Saul slew all the priests of the place.                                                                                                                                        

Zadok son of Ahitub was a Levite priest during the time of King David. For a long time, he was co-high priest with Abiathar. Zadok was a descendant of Aaron and a leader over his family of Levites (1 Chronicles 27:17).  After Saul's death, Zadok went to David at Hebron and together with Abiathar, was David's chief priest. 

Abiathar was the only one of the priests to escape from Saul (reigned c. 1020–1000 BCE)'s massacre in Nob, when his father and the priests of Nob were slain on the command of Saul. He fled to David (reigned c. 1003–970 BCE) at Keilah, taking with him the ephod and other priestly regalia. Rabbinical literature that linked the later extermination of the male descendants of David with the priests of Nob, also link the survival of David's descendant, Joash with that of Abiathar. On David's command, Abiathar anointed Solomon as king.  

Solomon appointed Zadok's son a high priest in the Temple and from that time the high priesthood remained in the Zadokite family until the period of the Hasmonean rising.  Even after their deposition from their high office, many aristocratic priestly families claimed kinship with this family.  it is not known whether the sons of Zadok mentioned in the Dead Sea Scrolls have any connection with this family.  Zadok was also the name of one of the Pharisees who with Judah the Galilean founded the Sect of Zealots in 6 CE.  

After the conquest of Canaan, the Levites were expected to teach the Torah to the people, being therefore excluded from any territorial inheritance but receiving 48 towns and surrounding lands throughout the country, as well as the tithe of the agricultural produce.  This arrangement worked somewhat differently in practice.  Certain towns assigned to the Levites were only captured a long time after the conquest, or not at all, and there is no evidence to show how effective was the collection of tithes.  As a result, some of the Levites served at High Places, especially in the Northern Kingdom after King Jeroboam (930-910 BCE)  had instituted independent worship. Jeroboam's capital of the north was Shechem, and this was after Solomon had died and Israel broke apart into Israel and Judah.  To combat the influence of the Jerusalem Temple, he set up new shrines at Bethel and Dan with a similar cult but centering around the symbols of golden calves.  The bible and Talmudic sources are violently hostile to Jeroboam I who "sinned and caused Israel to sin."

                                                                          High Priest -Kohen Gadol 

As it came to be, Aaron's direct descendants  were to be the Cohens or Priests of the 12 tribes.  The Cohen was the chosen holy instrument to mediate between man and G-d.  Originally every Israelite family head was consecrated to serve as the priest with the 1st-born son who was regarded as the inheritor of his father's house and was in a position of considerable power.   

This arrangement was maintained until after the Exodus when the 1st-born became suspect as a result of the Golden Calf incident, and then with such a disappointment, including Aaron's situation of not being able to stop the people from such a deviation of what Moses was working hard to bring to an end, Moses changed the rules.  The tribe of Levi was selected in their stead.  They were chosen because of their loyalty of Aaron in trying to stop the Golden Calf incident.  

Each family of Levi was assigned specific duties connected with the transport and assembly of the parts of the Tabernacle in the wilderness.  The family of Aaron was singled out for service within the Tabernacle and later the Temple after it was built as priests.                                                                                    

Most of the Levites were thereafter employed in work connected with the Tabernacle, but the family of Aaron became the actual Cohen responsible for special duties; the sacrifices, the supervision of hygienic purity (kashrut) and instructing the people in the Mosaic Law.  One priest out of all was chosen as the High Priest-Kohen Gadol,  who was also charged with Divination through the Urim and Thummim.  

Divination came in many forms throughout the Middle East.  The Urim and Thummim were sacred means of divination used by the early Hebrews.  Their nature has not been exactly determined, but they were attached to the breastplate of the high priest.  The divination apparently involved the use of 2 stones or tablets which, according to ancient Hebrew belief, could answer questions, on occasions fateful for the nation or its rulers.  After the time of David, with the growth of prophetic influence, their usage is not mentioned.  

To prevent the Cohen acquiring political domination (a normal phenomenon among neighboring peoples like Egypt, for instance),  the tribe of Levi was excluded from acquiring its own tract of territory,, and its livelihood came from the contribution of Tithes, while the Cohen received a tenth of the Levites' tithe and also a portion of the sacrifices offered.  

The priesthood was hereditary and the Cohens were subject to strict laws regarding contamination by corpses and the choice of a wife.  While worshiping, they wore a distinctive dress.  Special cities were assigned to them in the territories of the various tribes.  The Cohens lived in every tribe's territory with different people, living in their homes.  These laws, laid down prior to the conquest of Canaan, evolved differently when the Israelites settled in their land.  Moses died outside of Canaan, so Joshua had to take over his plans for the people.  

The descendants of Aaron concentrated living around the Tabernacle, but local shrines were also established; either following a local revelation or to meet needs, and these were serviced by other Cohens, often Levites.  David (I chron. 24) reorganized the priesthood and Levites about the future Temple in Jerusalem, arranging 24 watches of Cohens and corresponding watches of Levites, singers, and gatekeepers.                                                  

In his utopian Temple plan, Ezekiel replaced the non-Jewish Nethinim (Temple servants, originally conquered Canaanites who were said to have been allotted by David to the Levites for menial service in the Temple)with the Levites, but this scheme was never executed.  When the Jews were exiled to Babylon in 597 BCE and 586 BCE, the Nethinim were included and also returned with them under Zerubbabel and Ezra, being given a special quarter of Jerusalem.  

The Nethinim maintained their identity down to amoraic times.  Traditionally, the Amoraic period is reckoned as seven or eight generations (depending on where one begins and ends). The last Amoraim are generally considered to be Ravina I and Rav Ashi, and Ravina II, nephew of Ravina I, who codified the Babylonian Talmud around 500 CE.  In other words, the great sages of the Mishnah and Talmud.

In 2nd Temple times,  the Cohens outnumbered the Levites, and apparently shared their tithe.  In halakhah, the Levite is regarded as 2nd to the Cohen, as at the Reading of the Law, and has the privilege of having the Cohen's hands before the latter blesses the people.  

  Today the Cohens or priestly line still exist, with many of the  responsibilities.  Their position is told to their sons, and their DNA show up as J1 and J2.  They were also in the Sanhedrin.  There are families who can trace their lines back to RASHI (1040-1105)  who had a tree going back to King David. Rashi was an only child born at Troyes, Champagne, in northern France. His mother's brother was Simeon bar Isaac, rabbi of Mainz. Simon was a disciple of Gershom ben Judah, who died that same year. On his father's side, Rashi has been claimed to be a 33rd-generation descendant of Johanan HaSandlar, who was a fourth-generation descendant of Gamaliel, who was reputedly descended from the Davidic line.

Gamaliel was the name of 6 rabbis, one a descendant of Hillel of 1st century BCE who wrote the Golden rule, with the Elder who was president of the Sanhedrin at Jerusalem, grandson of Hillel, president of Sanhedrin after the death of Jonathan ben Zakkai.

The amazing thing is that Cohens in the synagogue, men who were told by their fathers that they were Cohens, have taken DNA tests and have found the J1 DNA, proving that they are Cohens.  

I personally have 477 Cohens with this spelling at FTDNA directly connected to my father's line with DNA connections, and have a total of   928 Cohens matching me.  One Cohen I know is a Hochfeld.  There are Jews who chose other surnames but were Cohens like his family.  My friend and distant cousin, Victor, has 1,309 Cohens matching his DNA.  Cohens may be the line that has survived the best through the years.    

The Cohen line is patrilineal -- passed from father to son without interruption for 3,300 years.                                               

Cohens kept a practice up of headstones in cemeteries with the information of being a Cohen on it picturing hands.  KOHANIM (COHANIM) HANDS - Hands with thumbs (and sometimes forefingers) joined.  On Jewish tombstones you will sometimes see a symbol showing two hands arranged for the Priestly Blessing like the example here. This is a symbol of the Kohen or Cohen (Hebrew for priest). The plural form is Kohanim or Cohanim.                 

The Western Wall (Kotel in Hebrew) is under the supervision of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel.  The wall is the only ancient place allowed to Jews for praying.  

Some Jewish surnames frequently associated with this symbol are Conn or Cohn (Kohn), Cahn (Kahn), and Cohen (Kohen), but you will find the symbol on the grave markers of people with other surnames.  Today families can sometimes verify a priestly lineage from the tombstones of ancestors that have this symbol. 

Israel has had 2 head rabbis, one for the Ashkenazim and one for the Sephardim.  The present Sephardi Chief Rabbi is Yitzhak Yosef, and the Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi is David Lau, both of whom began their terms in 2013. The Rabbinate has jurisdiction over many aspects of Jewish life in Israel.   Its jurisdiction includes personal status issues, such as Jewish marriages and Jewish divorce, as well as Jewish burials, conversion to Judaism, kosher laws and kosher certification, Jewish immigrants to Israel (olim), supervision of Jewish holy sites, working with various ritual baths (mikvaot) and yeshivas, and overseeing Rabbinical courts in Israel.

  

Resource:

The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia

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

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

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

https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/high-priest/

https://www.aish.com/ci/sam/48936742.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chief_Rabbinate_of_Israel#:~:text=The%20present%20Sephardi%20Chief%20Rabbi,of%20Jewish%20life%20in%20Israel.