The lost tribes of Israel

[Thorwald Johansen]

I have discussed this topic with several ministers (Protestant & R.C.), a rabbi, and other Christians on different religious forums. No one seems to know what happened to the Israelite tribes that were taken captive by the Assyrians around 800 B.C.

I read the overview of the book published by E. Raymond Capt (Australian biblical archeologist), in which, he states that he re-interpreted the Assyrian tablets, and traced the lost tribes to the throne of England (as well as other places). Is this possible?

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Is this possible?

Nope.

 

[Thorwald Johansen]

Nope.

Why not? Further, if the descendants of these tribes are still with us, is it not correct to assume, that there are Israelites who believe that they are gentiles? If this is true, can we assume that Christ's death and resurrection may have occurred during the passover, in order for these Israelites to celebrate the passover while celebrating the death and resurrection of Christ at Easter? In other words, has God made certain that His commandment to the Israelites to celebrate the passover annually, is not broken? If the Israelite Christians do not know that they are in fact 'Israelites', this may be God's way of protecting them, from breaking His command. Just a thought.

 

[Zardoz]

If one does not have a Jewish mother, then except for conversion one is not Jewish. If a group is assimilated with gentiles then it won't take long before no one is a Jew anymore, just a few generations.

The 'lost' tribes are not 'lost' as in "I lost my keys" they are lost as in "all the souls who were in the Titanic are lost at sea".

They're gone. Period.

 

[Levite]

I have discussed this topic with several ministers (Protestant & R.C.), a rabbi, and other Christians on different religious forums. No one seems to know what happened to the Israelite tribes that were taken captive by the Assyrians around 800 B.C.

I read the overview of the book published by E. Raymond Capt (Australian biblical archeologist), in which, he states that he re-interpreted the Assyrian tablets, and traced the lost tribes to the throne of England (as well as other places). Is this possible?

Yeah, not so much. This is an idea that was extremely popular amongst English Bible scholars in the nineteenth century. There was something of a fad of country parsons and parish vicars with little to occupy their time producing books speculating on various ethnicities or nationalities actually being "Lost tribes of Israel." At one point or another, nearly everyone seemed to be a lost tribe. My favorites, I think, were the Welsh, the Basques, the Berbers, and the Mayans.

Unfortunately, it's all nonsense, I'm afraid.

When the Assyrians deported and exiled the majority of the populace of the Northern Kingdom (save for some few that fled south to the Kingdom of Judah), they deliberately scattered clans and families all over the Assyrian empire, so as to break the cohesion of the tribal structure. This essentially ensured that the exiles would completely assimilate into the surrounding populace. Quite likely, within several generations, their identity as Israelites would have been entirely lost.

There have been several "lost" Jewish communities that have been found over the past few decades, some of whom have claimed to be survivors of the Lost Tribes; but in most cases, it seems clear that while their communities are ancient, they were originated long after the Fall of the Northern Kingdom. The only communities ancient enough to potentially be either survivors of the North Kingdom or communties who fled the Assyrian conquest are the Beta Yisrael, the Jewish community of Ethiopia, which claimed to have originated in time of the First Temple, and seem to have some supporting cultural and linguistic evidence to back that claim up; and the Lemba people of southern Africa, whose genetics are better than 50% semitic, and whose priests all have the kohen gene marker shared by priestly families in all the Jewish world.

But with the possible exception of these two communities, the Lost Tribes are simply lost. They are, as Zardoz pointed out, not lost as in misplaced, but as in passed on, are no more, ceased to be, expired and gone to meet their maker....

 

[Flankerl]

If one does not have a Jewish mother, then except for conversion one is not Jewish. If a group is assimilated with gentiles then it won't take long before no one is a Jew anymore, just a few generations.

The 'lost' tribes are not 'lost' as in "I lost my keys" they are lost as in "all the souls who were in the Titanic are lost at sea".

They're gone. Period.

But with the possible exception of these two communities, the Lost Tribes are simply lost. They are, as Zardoz pointed out, not lost as in misplaced, but as in passed on, are no more, ceased to be, expired and gone to meet their maker....

I have to say you two i always liked the hope that one day perhaps not in my lifetime all tribes will "return". Perhaps people would somehow get the knowledge that their ancestors were from one of the tribes and they would endorse it... or so.


But you two really took my good mood away.

 

[Caladan]

I have to say you two i always liked the hope that one day perhaps not in my lifetime all tribes will "return". Perhaps people would somehow get the knowledge that their ancestors were from one of the tribes and they would endorse it... or so.


But you two really took my good mood away.

haha romantic. but I have to agree with the Rabbi Levite. traditionally the people who live in Israel today are considered to be from the tribe of Judah and Benjamin. the tribes of Israel, may live on in the Pashtun people of Afghanistan, and perhaps other ethnic groups in the middle east.

 

[smokydot]

I have discussed this topic with several ministers (Protestant & R.C.), a rabbi, and other Christians on different religious forums. No one seems to know what happened to the Israelite tribes that were taken captive by the Assyrians around 800 B.C.

The ten "lost tribes" of the northern kingdom were not lost in the exile, for they are "found" in the rest of the Bible.

1) in prophecies relating to the return from exile:

---Jer 3:18, 31:27, 31 (where "Israel" is the northern kingdom of the ten tribes)
---Eze 37:15-22 (where "Ephraim" is the norther kingdom of ten tribes--Isa 7:17)

2) return from exile: Ezra 6:17

3) NT: Ac 26:7, Jas 1:1

They are not now on the throne of England, because they were never "lost."

 

[MathewJames]

I like the thought that they were never lost. We can call them lost because we do not know where they are. But I do not think they were lost. A small tribe traveled north. They did not go with the majority to the south. They split in two to make the odds of surviving better.

 

[Levite]

I like the thought that they were never lost. We can call them lost because we do not know where they are. But I do not think they were lost. A small tribe traveled north. They did not go with the majority to the south. They split in two to make the odds of surviving better.

Actually, the majority of the Israelites were lost in the Assyrian exile. The Southern Kingdom was made up of only three tribes: Judah, Benjamin, and the majority of the tribe of Levi. The Northern Kingdom was made up of the other nine of the twelve tribes, plus a minority of the tribe of Levi: and of all the twelve tribes, Ephraim-- the dominant tribe in the Northern Kingdom-- was the most populous.

The two kingdoms did not voluntarily split to increase their odds of survival: the split between the two kingdoms predates the conflict with the Assyrians, and stems back to political infighting about centralization of authority and religion, quarrels over taxes, and the conflict between henotheism and monotheism. The Southern Kingdom believed that both government and religion should be centralized in Jerusalem, that the king had the right to impose taxes in order to support large national projects (such as building the Temple and royal palaces and so forth), and they leaned ever more toward monotheism. The Southern Kingdom was ruled without interruption by the Davidic dynasty. The Northern kingdom believed that government should be tribal, with the king holding authority relatively loosely, and with little authority to levy taxes; and that religion should be practiced at many shrines and slaughter-sites scattered over the land; they were not ruled by a dynasty, but by a succession of royal houses, whose ascent to the throne was often due merely to military prowess; and they were deeply henotheistic, worshipping many other gods alongside YHVH.

There is very little evidence, either textually or archaeologically, that the lost tribes did not, in fact, vanish into assimilation.

The ten "lost tribes" of the northern kingdom were not lost in the exile, for they are "found" in the rest of the Bible.

1) in prophecies relating to the return from exile:

---Jer 3:18, 31:27, 31 (where "Israel" is the northern kingdom of the ten tribes)
---Eze 37:15-22 (where "Ephraim" is the norther kingdom of ten tribes--Isa 7:17)

2) return from exile: Ezra 6:17

Of these, the prophecies of Jeremiah almost certainly do not mean the lost tribes. When Jeremiah uses the phrases bet Yehudah im bet Yisrael "the house of Judah and the house of Israel," he means it metaphorically, although some say he means the tribe of Benjamin. Yet even if he did mean it literally, Jeremiah lived less than 100 years after the Assyrian Exile, and he may have had reason to hope that the exiles might yet return under the proper conditions (which he believed to be the complete embrace of monotheism, and the proper worship of YHVH by all the Israelites). By the same token, Isaiah lived during the era of the Fall of the Northern Kingdom, and would have had great hopes that the exiles might yet survive and return home. These events were not historical or messianic for Isaiah and Jeremiah, but (loosely speaking) current events.

Ezekiel is a messianic prophet, who lived during the Babylonian Exile of 586 BCE, over 200 years after the Fall of the Northern Kingdom. His prophecies are, among many other things, an origination point of a school of messianic thought that believes that the messiah, when he comes, will be able to sort everyone's proper bloodlines, and any survivors of the lost tribes who have somehow remained Jewish will be able to reclaim their lost identity and return to the fold.

But there seems to be small chance of such a thing occurring. It is unlikely that any further lost Jewish communities will be discovered, and if they are, the vast majority of such communities found went into exile in much later times, long after the Assyrian Exiles-- it is deeply unlikely that a community could have preserved its Jewishness for over three thousand years and yet remain undiscovered in the modern world.

It is much likelier that Ezekiel's prophecies also were either conditional or were metaphorical or allegorical, using imagery not intended to be taken literally.

However, with Ezra, when he mentions all twelve tribes, this is because it was the custom in the Second Temple to still offer expiation for all twelve tribes, and to offer sacrifices in the names of all twelve tribes, even though the other tribes were long lost, and it was deemed that they would be lost until the end of time. They kept offering sacrifices and offering expiation for all twelve tribes as a memory of those lost, and because the Covenant was made with all twelve tribes, and most importantly, because a very small number of the Israelites of the Northern Kingdom had escaped the Assyrian Exile by fleeing to the Southern Kingdom, where, by the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, they had mostly forgotten or lost their tribal affiliations, as the Jews of the Second Temple period mostly lost tribal identity, except for the tribe of Levi, who were the priests. Therefore, sacrifices and expiations were offered in the name of all twelve tribes, because it was theoretically possible that the community contained some few individuals with descent from each of the twelve tribes, even if those individuals were unaware of it.

 

[smokydot]

Actually, the majority of the Israelites were lost in the Assyrian exile. The Southern Kingdom was made up of only three tribes: Judah, Benjamin, and the majority of the tribe of Levi. The Northern Kingdom was made up of the other nine of the twelve tribes, plus a minority of the tribe of Levi: and of all the twelve tribes, Ephraim-- the dominant tribe in the Northern Kingdom-- was the most populous.
The two kingdoms did not voluntarily split to increase their odds of survival: the split between the two kingdoms predates the conflict with the Assyrians, and stems back to political infighting about centralization of authority and religion, quarrels over taxes, and the conflict between henotheism and monotheism. The Southern Kingdom believed that both government and religion should be centralized in Jerusalem, that the king had the right to impose taxes in order to support large national projects (such as building the Temple and royal palaces and so forth), and they leaned ever more toward monotheism. The Southern Kingdom was ruled without interruption by the Davidic dynasty. The Northern kingdom believed that government should be tribal, with the king holding authority relatively loosely, and with little authority to levy taxes; and that religion should be practiced at many shrines and slaughter-sites scattered over the land; they were not ruled by a dynasty, but by a succession of royal houses, whose ascent to the throne was often due merely to military prowess; and they were deeply henotheistic, worshipping many other gods alongside YHVH.
There is very little evidence, either textually or archaeologically, that the lost tribes did not, in fact, vanish into assimilation.
Of these, the prophecies of Jeremiah almost certainly do not mean the lost tribes. When Jeremiah uses the phrases bet Yehudah im bet Yisrael "the house of Judah and the house of Israel," he means it metaphorically, although some say he means the tribe of Benjamin. Yet even if he did mean it literally, Jeremiah lived less than 100 years after the Assyrian Exile, and he may have had reason to hope that the exiles might yet return under the proper conditions

These aren't Jeremiah's words, they are God's words, which Jeremiah was told to proclaim to the north (10 tribes), that God would bring them back to the land of Canaan.
They aren't based in Jeremiah's hopes, they are based in God's words.

(which he believed to be the complete embrace of monotheism, and the proper worship of YHVH by all the Israelites). By the same token, Isaiah lived during the era of the Fall of the Northern Kingdom, and would have had great hopes that the exiles might yet survive and return home.
These events were not historical or messianic for Isaiah and Jeremiah, but (loosely speaking) current events.

The Isaiah reference I gave was to show the name Ephraim is used to mean the northern tribes.

Ezekiel is a messianic prophet, who lived during the Babylonian Exile of 586 BCE, over 200 years after the Fall of the Northern Kingdom.

Again, these are God's words, given to Ezekiel for his countrymen, promising that God would restore all the tribes back to their land as one nation.

His prophecies are, among many other things, an origination point of a school of messianic thought that believes that the messiah, when he comes, will be able to sort everyone's proper bloodlines, and any survivors of the lost tribes who have somehow remained Jewish will be able to reclaim their lost identity and return to the fold.
But there seems to be small chance of such a thing occurring. It is unlikely that any further lost Jewish communities will be discovered, and if they are, the vast majority of such communities found went into exile in much later times, long after the Assyrian Exiles-- it is deeply unlikely that a community could have preserved its Jewishness for over three thousand years and yet remain undiscovered in the modern world.
It is much likelier that Ezekiel's prophecies also were either conditional or were metaphorical or allegorical, using imagery not intended to be taken literally.
However, with Ezra, when he mentions all twelve tribes,

The list of people who return seems to indicate that perhaps 10,000-12,000 from northern tribes could have been included.

this is because it was the custom in the Second Temple to still offer expiation for all twelve tribes, and to offer sacrifices in the names of all twelve tribes, even though the other tribes were long lost, and it was deemed that they would be lost until the end of time. They kept offering sacrifices and offering expiation for all twelve tribes as a memory of those lost, and because the Covenant was made with all twelve tribes, and most importantly, because a very small number of the Israelites of the Northern Kingdom had escaped the Assyrian Exile by fleeing to the Southern Kingdom, where, by the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, they had mostly forgotten or lost their tribal affiliations, as the Jews of the Second Temple period mostly lost tribal identity, except for the tribe of Levi, who were the priests. Therefore, sacrifices and expiations were offered in the name of all twelve tribes, because it was theoretically possible that the community contained some few individuals with descent from each of the twelve tribes, even if those individuals were unaware of it.

Paul and James were Jews, who did not believe in offering sacrifices at the Temple, and yet they both speak of the 12 tribes as existing in the present--Ac 26:7, Jas 1:1.

Scripture doesn't exactly agree with what you present here.

 

[Levite]

These aren't Jeremiah's words, they are God's words...

This is an extremely literalist, and narrow fundamentalist way of reading text. It is not how most Jews read sacred text. Even among Orthodox Jews, not all believe that each word of a prophet's book was literally spoken by God. Many Jews have, historically, believed that God gave the prophets the essence of a message, in visions to be interpreted, which the prophet then fleshed out in his own words.

Narrowly literalist and uncontextualized readings of text are simply not what Jewish tradition teaches.

Paul and James were Jews, who did not believe in offering sacrifices at the Temple, and yet they both speak of the 12 tribes as existing in the present--Ac 26:7, Jas 1:1.

Those are Christian scriptures, with their own Christian idioms and agenda, and have no relevance to a discussion about the Jewish people, especially in the context of works and events from long before Christianity.

Scripture doesn't exactly agree with what you present here.

Only if you compel it to be read narrowly and rigidly, which is not how it was designed to be read. However Christians wish to read their scriptures, it is usually useful to recall that Jewish scriptures were written by Jews, for Jews, in the Jewish language, using Jewish idioms, about Jews and Jewish events, for interpretation and exegetical analysis using Jewish traditions and methodologies. They were not written by or for Christians, and their adoption by Christianity has no relevance to their meanings intended by their authors, or as read by their intended audience.

 

[smokydot]

This is an extremely literalist, and narrow fundamentalist way of reading text. It is not how most Jews read sacred text. Even among Orthodox Jews, not all believe that each word of a prophet's book was literally spoken by God. Many Jews have, historically, believed that God gave the prophets the essence of a message, in visions to be interpreted, which the prophet then fleshed out in his own words.
Narrowly literalist and uncontextualized readings of text are simply not what Jewish tradition teaches.
Those are Christian scriptures, with their own Christian idioms and agenda, and have no relevance to a discussion about the Jewish people, especially in the context of works and events from long before Christianity.
Only if you compel it to be read narrowly and rigidly, which is not how it was designed to be read. However Christians wish to read their scriptures, it is usually useful to recall that Jewish scriptures were written by Jews, for Jews, in the Jewish language, using Jewish idioms, about Jews and Jewish events, for interpretation and exegetical analysis using Jewish traditions and methodologies. They were not written by or for Christians, and their adoption by Christianity has no relevance to their meanings intended by their authors, or as read by their intended audience.

Good post.

Although I note in the NT that the Jews--Jesus, Peter, Paul, John and Jude--believed the OT Scriptures were actually the Word of God, written.

 

[Levite]

Good post.

Although I note in the NT that the Jews--Jesus, Peter, Paul, John and Jude--believed the OT Scriptures were actually the Word of God, written.

Presuming that the NT accurately represents the beliefs of those individuals. Many NT texts were written by non-Jews, who were unfamiliar with the nuances of Jewish culture and theology; and who had their own agenda and ideas in writing the texts. Also, many NT texts were redacted well after composition, introducing careless alterations, conflations, and intentional changes, causing more cohesively Christian ideas and theologies to be retrojected into the earlier narratives of Jewish characters.

Also, even if that was the belief of Jesus, he broke with mainstream Jewish culture. Who is to say that a literalist understanding of text (if, indeed, that was what he believed, which I am not convinced of) was not one more non-Jewishly-normative idea infused into early Christianity?

 

[smokydot]

Presuming that the NT accurately represents the beliefs of those individuals. Many NT texts were written by non-Jews, who were unfamiliar with the nuances of Jewish culture and theology;

The only non-Jew in the list is Luke, who wrote only two of the 27 books.

and who had their own agenda and ideas in writing the texts.

That is conjecture. There is no proof of that.

Also, many NT texts were redacted well after composition, introducing careless alterations, conflations, and intentional changes, causing more cohesively Christian ideas and theologies to be retrojected into the earlier narratives of Jewish characters.

That assumes facts not in evidence.

Also, even if that was the belief of Jesus, he broke with mainstream Jewish culture. Who is to say that a literalist understanding of text (if, indeed, that was what he believed, which I am not convinced of) was not one more non-Jewishly-normative idea infused into early Christianity?

Jewish norms were not the authority for Jesus of Nazareth. He took his orders from someone higher.

 

[Levite]

The only non-Jew in the list is Luke, who wrote only two of the 27 books.

If you accept the premise that all the books were written by those to whom the authorship is ascribed. At least in academic Biblical criticism, which is where I am familiar with Christian text and history from (and which is the only position from which I can really comment on Christian texts, since otherwise they are Christian business, and I am not a Christian), it is generally accepted that the ascriptions of authorship are not historically accurate.

That is conjecture. There is no proof of that.
That assumes facts not in evidence.

If you are using a completely ahistoric, uncritical, and fundamentalist approach to religion and text, then yes, that is true. But if one is not approaching religion and text from a fundamentalist position, and one is aware of and utilizing historical and critical analysis and evidence, then the ideas I have stated are hardly new, nor particularly inflammatory.

Jewish norms were not the authority for Jesus of Nazareth. He took his orders from someone higher.

If you are approaching the study of NT materials from a completely uncritical Christian position, then I suppose one can say this. However, if one is approaching the study of NT materials from an academic position, or any position of complex critical thought, this is a non-argument, as it is based in pure belief and not analytical evidence.

 

[smokydot]

If you accept the premise that all the books were written by those to whom the authorship is ascribed. At least in academic Biblical criticism, which is where I am familiar with Christian text and history from (and which is the only position from which I can really comment on Christian texts, since otherwise they are Christian business, and I am not a Christian), it is generally accepted that the ascriptions of authorship are not historically accurate

It is the testimony of the early Church fathers that the writers are as ascribed.

If you are using a completely ahistoric, uncritical, and fundamentalist approach to religion and text, then yes, that is true. But if one is not approaching religion and text from a fundamentalist position, and one is aware of and utilizing historical and critical analysis and evidence, then the ideas I have stated are hardly new, nor particularly inflammatory.

True.
But since I believe it is the Word of God, it is not subject to critical analysis.

If you are approaching the study of NT materials from a completely uncritical Christian position, then I suppose one can say this. However, if one is approaching the study of NT materials from an academic position, or any position of complex critical thought, this is a non-argument, as it is based in pure belief and not analytical evidence.

True.
Yes, I make no argument. I believe both the OT and the NT are the Word of God written. As such, they are not subject to critical analysis.

 

[MathewJames]

Thank you for that insight Levite!

 

[dogsgod]

Levite, it is my understanding that certain numbers in the Jewish tradition are special, they come with meanings of their own. For example, the number twelve was relevant to Jews and taken into consideration when the first gospel writer recorded there being twelve disciples of Christ, this may well have been understood by the reader at the time to mean that these twelve symbolized the coming together of the twelve tribes of Israel. Perhaps the ancient Jews recognized the mysteriousness, and the allusions to ancient scripture within this story, perhaps in some ways a rewrite of Moses, but was lost on the gentiles that came to accept these scriptures as writings of actual events. I'm curious as to your thoughts on this.

 

[Thorwald Johansen]

I have to say you two i always liked the hope that one day perhaps not in my lifetime all tribes will "return". Perhaps people would somehow get the knowledge that their ancestors were from one of the tribes and they would endorse it... or so.

But you two really took my good mood away.

The N/T says that 'All Israel shall be saved'. Perhaps there is still hope. Also, if you note, the Word of God ALWAYS came by way of anointed chosen people within the anointed tribes of Israel. Why would God have changed His ways, especially after His promise to Abraham? I believe that there are still descendants of the lost tribes, on this earth today. It is also written in the N/T, that the Israelites will have great joy (even more than the passover), when they come from all over the world, in order to return to the promised land, before the final battle(s). Is God just referring to the 'known' Jews?