Question Concerning the Alleged "Bnei Manasseh" (8 May, 2014, 8 Iyar, 5774)
Contents:
1. Introduction
2. Question from Sylvia concerning Claims of a Burmese Tribe to be Israelites.
3. Answer: They have no Proof Whatsoever for their Claims!
4. Self-Proclaimed Ephraimites are not Helping to Spread the Truth
5. It may be that the God of Israel wants Lost Israelites to Help Us?
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1. Introduction
We identify the Lost Ten Tribes with peoples in the west. There are other groups who claim to find them among eastern peoples. The Media publishes sensational article on the subject containing declarations that are based on fiction. We have answered these claims in the past but the questions keep coming up.
We do not intend to dwell on this matter.
To our mind the best counter to these falsehoods would entail greater support for our own researches and propagation activity.
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2. Question from Sylvia.
Sylvia wrote:
Yair, You see the unicorn as Manasseh. These people in India cannot be the unicorn too, can they?
How do you explain it? http://www.shavei.org/communities/bnei_menashe/articles-bnei_menashe/group-bearing-jewish-traditions-discovered-in-india/?lang=en
Sylvia
Quote:
Group Bearing Jewish Traditions Discovered in India
http://www.shavei.org/communities/bnei_menashe/articles-bnei_menashe/group-bearing-jewish-traditions-discovered-in-india/?lang=en
Yair Sheleg Haaretz (translated from Hebrew)
16/08/1999Extracts:
Descendants of the Tribe of Menashe Reside in Eastern India
Yitzhak Tang-Zhum, aged 30, was born a member of the Shinlung, a group residing in the region between India and Burma. Already at the age of 4, he relates, he became aware of the Shinlungs traditions linking them with the tribe of Menashe (Manasseh), one of the Ten Lost Tribes exiled from the Land of Israel by the Assyrians when they captured the Kingdom of Israel in the 8th century B.C.E....
Like Tang-Zhum, more than 300 of the Shinlung have emigrated to Israel in the past four years. They too have all undergone or are currently undergoing conversion. The person responsible for bringing them to Israel is Rabbi Eliyahu Avichail, whose lifes work has been devoted to discovering the Ten Lost Tribes and returning them to the Jewish people.
Rabbi Avichail says that he learned of the Shinlung some twenty years ago, when they contacted one of his friends, an immigrant from India named Shimshon Shimshon. They sought to make contact with the State of Israel out of a desire to immigrate.
The Shinlung are primarily concentrated in two states in eastern India: Manipur and Mizoram. According to Rabbi Avichail, they constitute a majority of the population in Mizoram. The current Prime Minister, as well as his predecessor, both belong to the tribe and identify with the link to the Tribe of Menashe.
Thus, one could speak of Mizoram as a Jewish state in eastern India, he says. The standing of the Shinlung in Manipur is also strong. They are one-third of the population of Manipur and have filled senior positions. Tang-Zhums father, Joshua, served until his retirement a year ago as Director-General of the states Employment Service.
Rabbi Avichail has visited the area a number of times to observe the group and study its connection with the Tribe of Menashe. According to his information, the Shinlung number approximately one-and-a-quarter million people, but according to their own research institute, the number in reality reaches some four-and-a-quarter million, some of whom are related not only to the Tribe of Menashe but also to the Tribe of Ephraim.
Rabbi Avichail was impressed that the Shinlungs connection to the Jewish people is indeed serious: They have an ancient tradition handed down orally from generation to generation which speaks of the Patriarchs Abram, Moriah (an apparent reference to Isaac, who was nearly sacrificed on Mount Moriah), and Jacob.
Until today they conduct a sacrificial ceremony on an altar which is very reminiscent of the altar in our Temple, and in which their priest uses the Hebrew name of G-d as it appears in the Bible. In this ceremony, their priest also mentions Mount Sinai, Mount Moriah and Mount Zion.
Rabbi Avichail adds, Until recent generations, when the Christian influence on them intensified, their custom was to perform circumcisions using stones in accordance with what is related in the Bible. They also have laws of leprosy which are very similar to those in the Bible. That is to say, the group preserved the early customs without undergoing the Rabbinical-Halachic revolution which led to Judaism as it is known today.
The connection with Rabbi Avichail led several thousand of the Shinlung to return completely to Judaism. He says, already in my first correspondence with them, I asked them to send two representatives to Israel so that we could better understand the nature of the group. Their representatives stayed in Israel for two years, studied Judaism and returned there as teachers of Judaism.
In the wake of the two teachers, some 3,500 members of the group began to live a fully Jewish life. Regarding those who returned to Judaism, Rabbi Avichail says, they even send their children to study at the Jewish school in Bombay, a distance of 1,000 kilometers from their homes.
And with their Judaism comes a desire to emigrate to Israel. Those several thousand, says Rabbi Avichail, are interested not only in returning to Judaism but also to their historic homeland, the Land of Israel. In recent years, a small aliyah has begun from among members of the group, amounting to 100 people annually.
We are aware of the sensitivities of the authorities in Israel, and therefore we have not requested permission for larger numbers of immigrants. Moreover, we too are not interested in a flood of immigrants, but in their return to Judaism. This is the reason that the Ministry of Interior has approved their immigration.
Members of the Shinlung who have come to Israel have received the status of temporary resident, which provides them with the regular rights of a citizen, but not the status of immigrants or an absorption basket of benefits. Rabbi Avichail has had to finance the entire immigration of the Shinlung from donations and from the funds of his organization, Amishav. He now wants the State to take this upon itself, as we are talking about Jews in every sense of the word who live a completely Jewish lifestyle.
From the Land of Israel to India in 2000 years
According to Rabbi Eliyahu Avichail, the Shinlungs path of wanderings has been long and arduous. The Ten Tribes which made up the Kingdom of Israel were exiled by Assyria in the 8th century BCE after rebelling against Assyrian rule. The Tribe of Manasseh, as part of the Ten Tribes, reached Assyria (present-day Iraq) and from there, according to Shinlung tradition, went to Afghanistan. From Afghanistan they went to the Himalayi (which Rabbi Avichail interprets as the Himalayan mountains), on to Mongolia and from there to southern China.
In China, the group was persecuted because of its unique faith and forced to hide in caves (from which comes their name, Shinlung, which means cave covering). Some 500 to 600 years ago, the Shinlung began to wander toward their current home between India and Burma.
End Quote.
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3. Answer: They have no Proof Whatsoever for their Claims!
Reply:
We have answered such questions several times in the past, e.g.
The Burma Blues. Who is Israel? The Burmese or "Danny Boy"?
http://britam.org/Burma.html
Impersonations.
Question Concerning Other Claimed Candidates to be from the Lost Ten Tribes
http://hebrewnations.com/articles/polemics/impersonations.html
Brit-Am Now no. 1986
1. Bill Rasmussen: Beta Israel, Bnei Menashe and other groups.
2. Impressions of the Bnei Manashe from a Neighbor.
http://hebrewnations.com/features/now/1986.html
In short,
There are NO traditions linking these people to Manasseh.
There are no ancient tradition linking them to Israel.
If such is not the case let them produce documentation for their claims as we do for ours.
Their desire to come to Israel and convert to Judaism in many cases is economically motivated.
There are no Shinling traditions concerning Israel or anyone else.
If we are wrong let the sources be shown. If necessary we will apologize with at least the same prominence of the present statements.
We all know that no apology will be necessary.
The Shinling in WW2 supported the Japanese. They are a low status ethnic group in danger from their neighbors and the general situation in their land.
Physical survival has priority.
Rabbi Avichail received impressive backing for his claims.
There is clone organization to his own Ami-Sav known as Shavei Yisrael headed by Michael Freund.
Both Avichail and Freund received impressive backing that have enabled them to function well and spread their message.
Those of the Shinling who come to Israel have problems.
Many of them however once they convert are genuine.
Theoretically, they may be descended from an offshoot of Manasseh who married non-Israelite women or of Israelite women who married non-Israelite men.
We do not know. We doubt it. There is no evidence. The claims are not substantiated. The claims are NOT MADE BY THEMSELVES but by others in their name.
At all events we disagree with their identification as Israelites.
Even if they are such (and we do not believe they are) they are not (in our opinion) those indicated by Scripture and the sources.
We rely on Biblical proofs combined with Secular Evidence.
While on the subject it should be pointed out that:
Every group that comes to Israel, such as Ethiopians, Russians, etc, has its own problems. The media often hides these in order to cause unnecessary fiction or unpleasantness.
We know individuals who married girls from this group. The girls often look nice and seem to have pleasant personalities. We wish them well.
I have also heard of at least one young man from this group who went to a Yeshivot and learnt very well. Others serve in the IDF.
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4. Self-Proclaimed Ephraimites are not Helping to Spread the Truth
We identify the Lost Ten Tribes with people in the west.
These too have problems.
People whom we feel should support us usually do not do so.
Even the so-called Ephraimites who claim to hold similar beliefs to our own seem to be against us.
The Ephraimites are Christians who adopt some Biblical customs and believe they descend from the Ten Tribes. Most of them are from the USA.
In the past they were sympathetic towards us but lately have drawn away from us as we have from them.
Some of them are openly anti-Jewish, e.g. Dummont of Sighted Moon.
Some (or most?) have missionary intentions towards the Jews; Most are heavily into Conspiracy Theories.
They also often support the pseudo-Karaite Nehemiah Gordon who specializes in inventing anti-Rabbinical exegetical fantasies .
In other words they seem to try very hard NOT TO BE ACCEPTED BY JUDAH while complaining about not being allowed in to the Land without a visa.
This negativity was not as noticeable in the past as it seems to be at present.
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5. It may be that the God of Israel wants Lost Israelites to Help Us?
We do what we can with very little resources. Sometimes we feel quite alone.
In our opinion they who agree with us should support us.
Those who do not agree with us but are interested in the subject should rationally justify their position.
We are what there is.
It may be that the God of Israel wants Lost Israelites to help us?