Menesseh ben Yisroel, the LTTs, and the West. 12th October 2026, 1 Cheshvan 5787.
Questions on
Rabbi Menesseh ben Israel, 1604-1657, is reported to have located the Lost Ten Tribes (LTTs) among the Amerindians.
He quotes verses from the Bible.
How should one reply to claims in his name?
See also:
Hebrew America -2.
Menasseh ben Israel and America Today
https://hebrewnations.com/articles/america/america2.html
See:
America as Israel. Cheat Sheet.
https://hebrewnations.com/articles/america/cheat.html
Menesseh ben Israel (Manoel Dias Soeiro 1604-1657) moved with his family in fear of the Spanish Inquisition from Portugal to the Netherlands in 1610.
Menesseh was off Jewish descent but had to re-convert to Judaism. This had become required from all Marranos i.e. Jews of Spain and Portugal whose ancestors had become Christian and later they wished to reclaim their Judaism.
Menesseh became a Rabbi and was very learned. He wrote a work on re-incarnation in Judaism and also two large volumes of questions and answers, each of these works was known as "Conciliator". One was on the Pentateuch (Five Book of Moses) and the other on the rest of the Bible. The book on reincarnation I have not yet read. The other two we recommend. These books are available in English translation. I read them (or parts of them) some time ago but I have not seen them around. Manesseh may have also written other works.
These books also contain information pertinent to the Lost Ten Tribes (LTTs) of Israel studies.
Meanwhile a Marrano Sephardic Jew, known as Aharon HaLevi, from Portugal persuaded Menasseh Ben Israel that he had found one of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel living in the jungles of Ecuador. He may have ben in a state of delirium at the time. He was certain that the Amerindians he had met in the wild had spoken to him in Hebrew. It is not known how much Hebrew he himself knew. At all events he returned to Amsterdam and swore on a Torah scroll in the presence of Rabbis (including Menesseh ben Israel) that they had said a few words in Hebrew to him. This supposed discovery was believed by Menasseh. It gave a new impulse to his Messianic hopes. Mensseh wrote a book on the subject, "The Hope of Israel".
His belief that the LTTs were in America was founded on two main sources:
(a) The testimony of Aharon HaLevi. This has since been dismissed by scholars.
(b) Biblical Sources.
Aharon Halevi was apparently mistaken and he misled Menesseh ben Yisroel BUT concenring the Biblical Sources there was no mistake.
The Bible says the LTTs will return from the West and from America.
They shall come back from North AMERICA and from Western Europe!
It also infers that at least a portion of them will return by Air travel. Menesseh did not relate to this since in his time travel by air did not exist. He could not see its relevance.
It will be noted that all this goings-on with Menesseh was taking place not that long after the Americas had been discovered but while they were till being opened up. The French, English and Dutch colonization of North America had just begun or was about to begin.
Menesseh assumed that the Prophecies applied to his own time. They did not.
They were applicable to a later date. To our time.
Apart from the time of occurrence they were correct.
The Bible says the LTTs wuill return from North America and from Western Europe!
Menesseh at the beginning of his work mentioned Hebrew inscriptions that had been found in the Azores which are islands in the Atlantic Ocean west of Portugal. The earliest known inhabitants of the (AZORES) appear to have come from Scandinavia. After them there came Carthaginians from North Africa, and later the Portuguese. The Azores now belong to Portugal.
Menasseh ben Israel believed the Lost Ten Tribes were in eight places. This was based on Isaiah 11:
Isaiah (NKJV) 11:
11 IT SHALL COME TO PASS IN THAT DAY
THAT THE LORD SHALL SET HIS HAND AGAIN THE SECOND TIME
TO RECOVER THE REMNANT OF HIS PEOPLE WHO ARE LEFT,
FROM ASSYRIA AND EGYPT,
FROM PATHROS AND CUSH,
FROM ELAM AND SHINAR,
FROM HAMATH AND THE ISLANDS OF THE SEA.
Brit-Am agrees with this but says that the places named were not same as is often assumed, for example Egypt (in Hebrew "Mitsraim") is not always that place known to us today by that name.
Manasseh himself took a similar view.
The Islands in the West.
Menesseh says:
# ....THE ISLANDS OF THE SEA, SO MOST TRANSLATE IT; BUT I THINK IT IS TO BE RENDERED THE ISLANDS OF THE WEST, FOR ("YAM") IN HOLY SCRIPTURE SIGNIFIES "THE WEST," AS IN GENESIS 28:14, AND IN MANY OTHER PLACES; AND UPON THIS ACCOUNT THOSE ISRAELITES ARE IMPLIED, WHO ARE WESTWARD FROM THE HOLY LAND, AMONG WHOM THE AMERICANS ARE.#
Isaiah 60:
9 SURELY THE ISLES SHALL TRUST IN [WAIT FOR] ME, AND THE SHIPS OF TARSHISH FIRST, TO BRING THY SONS FROM FAR, THEIR SILVER AND THEIR GOLD WITH THEM...
# They shall then come with seed from those countries, prostrating themselves at the Mountain of the LORD in Jerusalem, as the Prophet Hosea says of that Redemption.
They will also arrtive by Air Travel.
Hosea 11:
10 THEY SHALL WALK AFTER THE LORD.
HE WILL ROAR LIKE A LION.
WHEN HE ROARS,
THEN HIS SONS SHALL COME TREMBLING FROM THE WEST;
11 THEY SHALL COME TREMBLING LIKE A BIRD FROM EGYPT,
LIKE A DOVE FROM THE LAND OF ASSYRIA.
AND I WILL LET THEM DWELL IN THEIR HOUSES,
SAYS THE LORD.
so says Isaiah in:
Isaiah 60:
8 WHO ARE THESE WHO FLY LIKE A CLOUD,
AND LIKE DOVES TO THEIR ROOSTS?
9 SURELY THE ISLES SHALL WAIT FOR ME, AND THE SHIPS OF TARSHISH FIRST, TO BRING THY SONS FROM FAR, THEIR SILVER AND THEIR GOLD WITH THEM, FOR THE NAME OF THE LORD THY GOD, AND FOR THE HOLY ONE OF ISRAEL, BECAUSE HE HATH GLORIFIED THEE.
Westward Location. Isles. Tarshish.
Menesseh considered his own Age to be close to the End of Ages and the Amerindians to be the Lost Ten Tribes.
He was mistaken on both counts.
Nevertheless, concerning where the Ten Tribes would return from he was nit mistaken. The USA did not exist in his time but it has done so since and is still with us. That is where the LTTs will return from, as well as from Canada.
Among the verses Menesseh quotes are two implying air-travel.
Isaiah 11:
11 THEY SHALL COME TREMBLING LIKE A BIRD FROM EGYPT,
LIKE A DOVE FROM THE LAND OF ASSYRIA.
Isaiah 60:
8 WHO ARE THESE WHO FLY LIKE A CLOUD,
AND LIKE DOVES TO THEIR ROOSTS?
Airplanes did not exist in the time of Menesseh. They do now.
The Lost Ten Tribes were not yet in America in the time of Menesseh. They are now.
Even though MBI said the LTTs were in 8 places he placed the emphasis of his work on America.
Meanwhile in England the local ruler, Oliver Cromwell and his secretary John Saddler, believed the English were descended from the LTTs.
John Sadler wrote a book on the subject comparing traditional English Jurisprudence to that of the Ancient Hebrews.
Menasseh may also have shared this belief though he never expressly mentioned it.
Menesseh was invited to England where the re-admission of the Jews (who had been expelled in 1290) and was discussed and in a de facto sense allowed.