by Michael Freund
Pashtun practices include circumcision on the eighth day and refraining from mixing meat and milk — Is there a connection to ancient Hebrews?
TALIBAN FORCES patrol in front of Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, September 2
(photo credit: STRINGER/ REUTERS)
With the fall of Kabul into the hands of the Taliban
just shy of the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, the
world’s attention has once again turned to Afghanistan.
Tucked
away in south-central Asia, with unsavory neighbors such as Iran to the
west and Pakistan to the east, the landlocked country, which once
served as a base of operations for al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, is as
beguiling as it is complex.
And
yet amid its turbulent past, in which it has served as a flashpoint for
the British Empire, the Soviet Union and now the United States,
Afghanistan has long been home to one of the more intriguing unsolved
mysteries of Jewish history: the fate of some of the Ten Lost Tribes of
Israel.
Periodically
over the past two decades, newspaper headlines have raised the
tantalizing question of whether the Pashtun tribes who make up most of
the Taliban are in fact our long-lost relatives, descendants of the
Israelites who were cast into exile by the Assyrian emp
ire more than
2,700 years ago.
While
the possibility of such a connection may strike some as fanciful, a
cursory look at the evidence suggests that it cannot and should not be
dismissed out of hand.
A TALIBAN member stands guard as Afghan men take pictures of a vehicle
from which rockets were fired, in Kabul, Afghanistan, August 30.
(credit: STRINGER/ REUTERS)The
Pashtuns, or Pathans, are said to number in the tens of millions, with
the bulk living in Pakistan, Afghanistan and India. They consist of
several hundred clans and tribes that have fiercely preserved their
heritage amid waves of foreign conquest and occupation.
Prior
to the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in the region, many of the
Pashtuns declared themselves to be what they referred to as Bani Israel
(Sons of Israel), an oral tradition that their ancestors passed down
through the generations.
This was noted by various Islamic travelers
and historians, stretching as far back as the 13th century, when there
was hardly any advantage to be gained by asserting an ancient Israelite
identity in Central Asia. Over the next 400 years, other Islamic
scholars and writers noted the persistence of the tradition.
In
the 19th century, a number of Westerners who visited the region became
convinced that the Pashtuns were in fact descendants of the Israelites.
In
his 1858 work, History of the Afghans, Joseph-Pierre Ferrier wrote that
the chief of one of the main Pashtun tribes, the Yusefzai (Sons of
Joseph), presented the Persian shah Nader Shah Afshar “with a Bible
written in Hebrew and several other articles that had been used in their
ancient worship and which they had preserved.”
Similarly,
Major Henry W. Bellew, who served in the British colonial Indian army,
in his 1861 work The Lost Tribes, wrote regarding the Pashtuns that,
“The nomenclature of their tribes and districts, both in ancient
geography, and at the present day, confirms this universal natural
tradition. Lastly, we have the route of the Israelites from Media to
Afghanistan and India marked by a series of intermediate stations
bearing the names of several of the tribes and clearly indicating the
stages of their long and arduous journey.”
More
recently, the late president of Israel, Yitzchak Ben-Zvi, in his 1957
study about far-flung Jewish communities The Exiled and the Redeemed,
devoted an entire chapter to “Afghan tribes and the traditions of their
origin.”
Basing
himself on scholarly research, as well as on interviews he conducted
with numerous Afghani Jews who made aliyah in the 1950s, Ben-Zvi wrote,
“The Afghan tribes, among whom the Jews have lived for generations, are
Moslems who retain to this day their amazing tradition about their
descent from the Ten Tribes.” While he cautiously notes that, “the
evidence in our possession is, of course, insufficient for practical
conclusions to be drawn therefrom,” he nonetheless correctly asserts,
“The fact that this tradition, and no other, has persisted among these
tribes is itself a weighty consideration.”
MODERN-DAY
scholars have added greatly to our stock of knowledge on this subject.
Dr. Navraz Aafreedi, an Indian academic in Kolkata who hails from a
Pashtun background, has written extensively and persuasively about the
evidence of an Israelite connection, and Dr. Eyal Be’eri, the leading
Israeli scholar on the Pashtuns, has recorded a series of their customs
and traditions that are identical to those of Jews.
These
include practices such as circumcision on the eighth day after birth,
refraining from mixing meat and milk, lighting candles on the eve of the
Sabbath and even levirate marriage.
Other scholars have noted similarities between the Pashtun’s ancient tribal code, the Pashtunwali, and Jewish traditions.
While
DNA studies have provided limited evidence to back up these assertions,
a 2017 article in the journal Mitochondrial DNA did find there to be “a
genetic connection of Jewish conglomeration in Khattak tribe,” one of
the Pashtun clans.
And although the Taliban have done a great deal to erase any trace of their pre-Islamic history, the tradition refuses to die.
As
Hebrew University anthropologist Dr. Shalva Weil has noted regarding
the Pashtuns’ link with the lost tribes of Israel, “There is more
convincing evidence” about them than anybody else.
This fascinating historical curiosity, however, should not blind us to the fact that the Taliban are viciously anti-Israel and no Pashtuns are known to have shown any public interest in returning to their Jewish roots.
Indeed,
as Dr. Be’eri has argued, even if the Pashtuns are biologically and
historically connected with the people of Israel, it still does not mean
that “tomorrow they will convert to Judaism and come to live in the
Land of Israel.”
Merely
talking about “mass conversion and migration of millions of Pashtuns
from Afghanistan and India into the State of Israel,” he has written,
could damage prospects for building greater regional cooperation and
understanding.
There
are, of course, other theories regarding the origins of the Pashtuns as
well as scholars who discount or reject the contention of an ancient
Israelite connection. But given the Pashtuns’ ancient civilization and
far-flung diaspora, and their key political and demographic role in
various parts of the Asian subcontinent, it would seem prudent for the
Jewish people to seek out avenues of dialogue with them if and wherever
feasible.
The mere
possibility of a shared historical identity could serve as a basis for
discussion between Jews and Pashtuns, one that could lead to a dampening
of hostility and suspicion and perhaps lay the groundwork for a
stronger relationship in the future.
In
light of their fanatical theology, the Taliban are of course not an
address for such efforts. But there are plenty of other Pashtuns
worldwide with whom we should seek to build bridges, whether or not one
believes them to be our long-lost cousins.
Michael Freund is founder and chairman of Shavei Israel (www.shavei.org), which reaches out and assists the Lost Tribes of Israel and other hidden Jewish communities.
Source: https://www.jpost.com/opinion/are-the-taliban-descendants-of-israel-678995
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