India's Jews Find Their Roots

[Jahnava Nitai Das 2]

India's Jews Find Their Roots

 

LONDON, ENGLAND, July 20, 2002: More than 2,000 years after they first claimed to have set foot in India, the mystery of the world's most obscure Jewish community -- the Marathi-speaking, Bene Israel -- may finally have been solved with genetic carbon-dating revealing they carry the unusual "Moses" gene that would make them, literally, the original children of Israel. Four years of DNA tests on the 4,000-strong Bene Israel, now mainly based in Mumbai, Pune, Thane and Ahmedabad, indicates they are probable descendants of a small group of hereditary Israelite priests or Cohanim. Tudor Parfitt, Jewish Studies professor at London's School of Oriental and African Studies, who initiated and led the research, says this is the first concrete proof that "exiles from Palestine made it as far as India and managed to maintain Judaism in the sea of Hinduism and Islam". Their Indian appearance, cricket-playing, sari-wearing, curry-eating and Marathi-speaking habits led to a bitter battle for recognition as "real Jews" and for years they were not allowed to emigrate to Israel.

 

[dasa 0]

The Tribe of Menashe Discovered in North East India

 

One of the most exciting events in the end-time redemption of Israel is the great testimony of the discovery of descendants of the tribe of Menashe in North East India. This tribe which numbers around 5 million has a very old tradition that they are the tribe of Menashe which was taken from Israel after the destruction of the Northern Kingdom by the Assyrians. They observe Shabbat and the festivals and the Biblical Jewish laws. They have synagogues and sing "We desire Zion" and pray to the G-d of Israel to answer and fulfill their desires to return to Zion and they direct their prayers towards the Temple Mount which is called by them, Mount Zion. They are deeply connected to the people of Israel and a major desire is to return to Israel.

 

The Government of Israel may soon send a team to north East India to meet the communities of the tribe of Menashe to learn everything about them and to investigate how to reunite them with the people and land of Israel. The advisor to the Prime Minister of Israel regarding Diaspora Jewry, Channa Isakov, advised the Knesset that this team be sent. The Chief Rabbinate of Israel is now checking the possibility to bring the tribe back to Israel.

 

Last year the Israeli Ministry of the Interior, gave citizenship to the first hundred members of the tribe and they are now in Israel. Rabbi Eliyahu Avichail was the first to discover the descendants of Menashe in India in 1979. In his testimony he stated that in this year a letter came to him from the Menashe Jews and he immediately travelled to meet them in India. His initial conclusion on meeting them was that they are deeply connected and are a part of the people of Israel. Rabbi Avichail is the man who for many years has pushed this issue. He has travelled to the East on many occasions to discover descendants of the ten Lost tribes of Israel. According to him he has discovered descendants of all ten tribes in India and in the high mountains of Afghanistan. He also discovered that they still call themselves by the original names of the Ten Tribes. He continues to research the matter and will not stop until he has discovered all the descendants. He brought to the attention of the Knesset very clear evidence of the deep connection of the members of the tribe in India to Israel and to the Jewish tradition and heritage. He continues his research into the remainder of the Ten Tribes.

 

On his recent return from North East India where he visited the Menashe communities, Rob Wolfsohn, a journalist who is writing a book on the Menashe communities, stated that in the area of Manipur, he found a synagogue of the Menashe tribe and when he prayed in this synagogue he felt that he could have been in a synagogue in Brooklyn. He said that he had gone to the place not believing that the story was true, but that he had returned with a deep feeling that there is evidence of a very ancient linkage of the Menashe communities to the people and land of Israel.

(from the hope-of-israel.org)

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13:39 And as for your seeing him gather to himself another multitude that was peaceable,

13:40 these are the ten tribes which were led away from their own land into captivity in the days of King Hoshea, whom Shalmaneser the king of the Assyrians led captive; he took them across the river, and they were taken into another land.

13:41 But they formed this plan for themselves, that they would leave the multitude of the nations and go to a more distant region, where mankind had never lived,

13:42 that there at least they might keep their statutes which they had not kept in their own land.

13:43 And they went in by the narrow passages of the Euphrates river.

13:44 For at that time the Most High performed signs for them, and stopped the channels of the river until they had passed over.

13:45 Through that region there was a long way to go, a journey of a year and a half; and that country is called Arzareth.

13:46 "Then they dwelt there until the last times; and now, when they are about to come again,

13:47 the Most High will stop the channels of the river again, so that they may be able to pass over. Therefore you saw the multitude gathered together in peace.

13:48 But those who are left of your people, who are found within my holy borders, shall be saved.

13:49 Therefore when he destroys the multitude of the nations that are gathered together, he will defend the people who remain.

13:50 And then he will show them very many wonders."

[Guest guest]

 

Israeli Tribes: Once Lost

and Now Found?

 

Searching for the Lost Tribes of Israel in India and Afghanistan

 

 

NEWSWEEK

 

Oct. 21 issue — When the veteran Israeli journalist Hillel Halkin began hunting for the Lost Tribes of Israel four years ago, he thought the claim that a community of Indians on the Burmese border was descended from one of the tribes was either a fantasy or a hoax. The fate of Israel’s 10 lost tribes, which, after being driven from ancient Palestine in the eighth century B.C. by Assyrian conquerors, disappeared into ethnic oblivion, ranks among history’s biggest mysteries.

 

ON HIS THIRD trip to the Indian states of Manipur and Mizoram, Halkin was shown texts that convinced him that the community, which calls itself the Bnei Menashe, has roots in the lost tribe of Menashe. The documents included a will and words to a song about the Red Sea.

The argument, made in his new book “Across the Sabbath River” (Houghton Mifflin), is not just academic. Some Israeli rabbis believe descendants of the lost tribes number more than 35 million around the world and could help offset the sharply increasing Palestinian population. As founder of the organization Amishav (My People Return), Eliyahu Avichail trots the globe in search of lost Jews, in order to bring them back to their religion through conversation and direct them to Israel. He’s even hoping to make it to Afghanistan later this year. “I believe that groups like the Bnei Menashe are part of the solution to Israel’s demographic problems,” says Amishav director Michael Freund. The group has already brought 700 of the Bnei Menashe to Israel and believes thousands more are eager to come. Most have been put up in settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip—the main arena of Israeli-Palestinian fighting.

Last week at Utniel, a hilltop settlement south of Hebron, a few of the recent Indian immigrants brought back by Amishav sat on the grass during a break from their Jewish studies, singing songs they learned in Manipur about redemption in Jerusalem. A day earlier, Palestinians had shot two Israelis in an ambush a few miles up the road from the settlement. “We feel good here; we’re not scared,” says one of the students, Yosef Thangjom. At another settlement in the area, Kiryat Arba, Manipur native Odelia Khongsai explains why she chose to leave India two years ago, where she had family and a good job. “I had everything a person could want, but I still felt some-thing spiritual was missing.”

Halkin plans to return to India in February with a team of Israeli and American doctors who will conduct genetic tests on the Bnei Menashe to determine scientifically if their ancestors hail from ancient Palestine. But this time it’s the Bnei Menashe who are skeptical. “I think DNA testing is just hogwash,” says Khongsai, who lives with her 6-year-old daughter in a trailer home in Kiryat Arba. “I know I’m a Jew from the Bnei Menashe tribe, and that’s all that matters.”

—Dan Ephron

[Guest guest]

The existence of Semitic populations in India may explain the ease with which Islaam spread to minority segements in the region. In many ways, Islaam is very similar to Judaism, such as One Invisible indivisible idea of God, fasting for a month, regarding Friday and Saturday as Holy Days etc

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to go back to a land of hatred.

[Guest guest]

Hinduism has shown itself to be a tolerant religion, by allowing these non Hindu minorities to co-exist peacefully, within the Indus River region, for thousands of years.

[Guest guest]

I wonder if the menashe community so called are the lost tribe. The research in their genetic exam is a must for a proven reality. How long the Amishav will remain silent without genetic test ?

[Guest guest]

Dear,

A land of hatred you mean is your imagination from outside world. The land of Israel is a land of peace and love. A centre for the world to have peace in the end. Moreover, whatever may happen but it is our land which we have to defend. The pigmies who surround us are only ants in the eyes of G-d. There is nothing to fear and there is no place like Jerusalem for us. It is the only land and eternity. I wish you have faith in Hashem We will seek His will where hatred comes from outside and love will flow

 

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Moreover, whatever may happen but it is our land which we have to defend. The pigmies who surround us are only ants in the eyes of G-d.

 

 

It is Not your land. You are Not God.

[Guest guest]

Hare Krishna,

 

 

Dear,

A land of hatred you mean is your imagination from outside world. The land of Israel is a land of peace and love. A centre for the world to have peace in the end. Moreover, whatever may happen but it is our land which we have to defend. The pigmies who surround us are only ants in the eyes of G-d. There is nothing to fear and there is no place like Jerusalem for us. It is the only land and eternity. I wish you have faith in Hashem We will seek His will where hatred comes from outside and love will flow

 

 

This is what is called hypocricy. Thinking that only he is good in the eyes of any g-d and that others are filthy because they do not follow your religion. This is exactly what leads to intolerance. Thinking that only your land is the center of the universe, this is all height of hypocricy and hatred. This is no religion but politics and guys that think like you are demonic in tendency and nature.

 

I have no hatred for jews, but such thoughts are surely demonic.

 

On the other hand I am sure that islamic terrorists are wrong.

 

I would advise all jews to change their attitude toward people of other religions.

[Kulapavana 0]

"The pigmies who surround us are only ants in the eyes of G-d"

 

this is what their scripture teaches them, and those who follow it act accordingly. Talmudic writings are full of contempt for other people and proclaim absolute superiority of their race. fortunately not all Jews think like that. some rejected their man-made scriptures for the spiritual culture of the Vaishnava tradition. by becoming devotees of Krishna they should be seen as true Aryans and their material background is irrelevant.

[Guest guest]

it's tribal behavior. same as in north america previous to europeans and in africa. it keeps the population down, when people cant have the sense to stop reproducing otherwise, i.e., when the land is full. there needs to be civilized behavior and the only way for that to occur is for cooperation to occur. these people are not capable of something as simple as cooperation. the muslims are not trying to take all of israel's land away, just a particular part. it seems very silly to me, like battling over whether or not to circumcise, or who gets the shiny red ball. it's all about power but whoever is truly in the spirit of god would know that god is more powerful than a small insignificant piece of land. eternity outside the material plane compared with a 'powerful' piece of land . . .. .if someone's power is so reliant on a piece of land, it must not really be their power to begin with. real strength comes from within. if i appear ignorant, i'm sorry, i'm not very well read on this subject, but this is how it appears to me