The Black Jews Of Africa (Part 1) -
Introducing the Hebrew Tribes of Africa
By
Jide Uwechia
Proto-Hebrew tribes and historical Jewish communities have existed in Africa over thousands of years. This series of essays on Africa`s Black Jewish communities has been written to highlight a part of Africa`s heritage that is rarely if ever acknowledged by the stage managed account of history promoted by the mafia-like western educational establishemnts which control the institutions of learning and research.
That the roots of the Hebrews lie in Africa is attested to by this famous saying in Numbers Chapter 22 verse 5 (often distorted beyond recognition) to wit: “There is a people comeout from Egypt: behold they cover the face of the earth…” Another biblical verse goes: “When Israel was a child, then I loved him and called him out of Egypt”. Hosea Chapter 11 verse 1.
Even before the advent of Abraham, it appears that a body polity known as the tribe of Dan existed in Kushitic Africa for the book of Genesis narrates in Chapter 14 verse 14 that Abraham pursued some Caananite army until he arrived at a place known as Dan. Prof Ben Johanan has aruged that the Falasha Jews of Ethiopia are part of the ancestral tribe of Dan. See Ben Johanan, “We the Black Jews.”
During the sojourn of Abraham (the pilgrim from Chaldees) to Kushitic North Africa, the book of Genesis Chapter 13 verse 1 suggested that Abram left Egypt and headed south (which geographically speaking points into Africa) towards the place of “his original tent” (a term which indicates original home land). This verse appears to propose that Chaldeans were originally from the land of Africa, and Abram seemed to have made somesort of pilgrimage into the land of his origin.Â
This should not be too confusing if one recalls that the first King of Mesopotamia was Nimrod the great, acknowledged in the bible and the Quoran as a black man from Africa. Nimrod famously laid the foundations ofone of the earliest civilizations of man known as Sumeria or Shinar in the bible. Nimrod’s black African kingdom later morphed into the kingdom of the Chaldees, from where Abraham is said to have commenced his many journeys. See Genesis Chapter 10 verse 8 – 11.
Thus the first geographical location where one encounters the tribe of the Israelites as a nation or a nationalistic expression was in Egypt, Africa. The traditions of the ancient Israelites who supposedly left Egypt for the land of Caanan were a codified strain of the ancient traditions of the Egyptians who had maintained the ways of their first ancestors who lived inside Africa, around the head waters of River Nile. Moses was reputedly very learned in Kemitic science, arts and traditions as noted in Acts Chapter 7 verse 22.
Chapter 19 of the book of Exodus makes it abundantly clear that the God YHVW the god of the Hebrews was originally an African based diety whose special abode was on top of an African mountain known as Mountain Sinai in North East of Africa.
Thus this ancient Israelite presence in Egypt and the ancient Kingdom of Kush suggests that this African tribe rose from the depths of Africa and has maintained an unbroken continuity in Africa since the beginning of living memory.
The ExodusÂ
Even after the so called exodus from Egypt and their settlement in the land of Israel, the Israelite tribes retained certain numerous thriving communities throughout Africa including the ones mentioned in the varous books of the bible such as Exodus, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, etc.
Moses’s father in law Jethro the Midianite whom traditions regard as an Ethiopian appears as the real founder intellectual and spiritual founder of the Israelites. He thought Moses and inspired him to fight for the freedom of his people. He introduced him to his God and gave him the basic laws which governed the lives of the Israelites and formed the basis of all their later laws and traditions. See Exodus Chapter 3 and Exodus Chapter 18 verse 23.
The Midianites, a prototypic Israelite tribe of Ethiopia remained behind in Africa during the so-called migrations to Caanan. See Exodus Chapter 18. The original Danites of the South who introduced Abram to the tenets of Hebrewism remained in Africa, they did not migrate to Caanan.Â
As well, many Israelites refused to leave Egypt with Moses whereas many others returned back to their African food basket as they quickly tired of the rigours of frontier life on the edges of the Sinai desert. There were also those who had ideological disagreements with Moses, some of who were among the many implicated in the carving of the golden calf (i.e. Horus). Those ones equally did not proceed with Moses to the so-called promised land because they were not willing to modify their ancient African ways and norms to match the version Moses was supposedly seeking to propagate.
Exile and Diapora
By the 10th and the 9th centuries B.C.E., Hebrew communities had thrived for many centuries and was widespread in Africa. It was a veritable network of traders and craftsmen.Â
Various potentates sought to use this network to further their interest. Kings David and Solomon purportedly sought to utilize this network of different communities to further the trading interests of the Israelite state. Often, in joint venture with the Caananites (i.e. Phoenicians) trade contacts were opened or consolidated in Africa through the mediation of some of those old African Hebrew communities. In addition to this older segment, many relatively recent Israelite immigrants settled in communities found throughout Egypt, Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia, Eriteria, Kenya, Tanzania, Mocambique and Southern Africa.
These settlements were intermittenly augmented with new influx of migrant refugees from the so-called holy land driven by insecurity, famine and regional conflicts. Following the conquest of Israel in the 8th century B.C.E. by the Assyrians, and the 6th century destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians, even more Jewish refugees fled into their older communities in Africa. At this time, black Kingdoms in and around Africa were overflowing with migrant Jews. Kingdoms like Yemen, Ethiopia, and the North African Punic Kingdoms up to Mauritania had substantial Jewish settlement.
If one were to pause and ask at this point: What ethnicity were those refugee Jews and why flee to Africa of all places? The response to these queries immediately underline the deep roots of Africa relative to the Hebrew tribes. Those fleeing Jews of the 8th and the 6th century B.C.E. were clearly depicted as Black African men and women with tight curly hair (the hair type of a typical west African) in the Assyrian and Babylonian bas-reliefs commemorating the respective conquests. For example, a sculptured wall relief excavated at ancient Nineveh illustrates the fall of Lachish by the army of king Sennacherib of Assyria. The Hebrews depicted therein were all black men. See image: http://www.bible-history.com/archaeology/assyria/jewish-captives-lachish.html.
Salman Rushdie citing Indian history books claims in a book “Last Sigh of Moor†published in 1995, that three waves of Jewish refugees has landed in India in the past. The first Jewish refugees, that had settled in India, arrived after Nabuchadonezer, king of Babylon conquered their land in the 6th century BC and expelled some and enslaved the others. They were…dark skinned people, probably of the AFROCOIDAL RACE.
It then becomes clear why segments of that population would seek refugee in Africa…because that was the home land…the motherland…the baseline. It was only within the protective embrace of the African motherland that the harried Jew could be safe from the Babylonian depredations. As an aside, the significance of this epoch must be recognized. This was the first group of Black people in history ever taken and sold into chattel slavery outside their territory.
To be continued…
August 7, 2007.
Jide Uwechia
I am now reading Nana Banchie Darkwah’s “The Africans who wrote the Bible,” and your introduction is very much agrees with her book. Why isn’t more of the general population not aware that the Jews were first black before they went to Europe to propagate Christianity as their own religion? Why do Europeans still worship the Black Madonna and Christ Child, in their cathedrals, if Christanity was a Jewish religion and not principally Ancient Egyptian? The truth need to come out. Keep giving up the truth!
I’m looking for a Torah Book that is more related to African Jews. Can you give me some advice on where to purchase this type of book if one exists.
To Karla Black: The Ethiopian Jews and the Black African Jews of So. Africa have original Torahs.
To Jide Uwechia: There were so many invasions into Egypt and several exodus’ because she was frequently invaded and under foreign control; I gathered from my own research that the Jews (Black Africans) did not take the name Jews or Hebrews, until after their exodus from egypt. Also Pharoah “big house” and pharisees the Jewish priests “to be outside of or different” (loosely translated)seem to be related. Please shed light on this theory of mine. Tchesar
. . I also read that Moses was a common name and that there was more than one Moses led exodus. Have you read or heard anything about this? Tchesar
i read Jesus was common also And Christus was even more so.
where is the original home of jews
what nonsense! cannabis inspired hogwash!
cannabis inspired hogwash………what a strange set of words………q da judge e da jury…….do you or dont ya brother. Jah lo0ve
were can I find more
afrocentric information on
the true history of the black
http://www.hebrewisraelites.org/
i dont think that the people of Mesapotamia were truely 100%black just like I dont think te Eygptians were at the end of their time. Though I think they were at the beginning.
GOOD INFO
this is good. I am from a small tribe in Kenya facing to be faced out in the world and what amazed me is that 90% of laws in leviticus is found in their tradition. is it possible this could be one of this african jews?
I often wonder why do we want to be called Black Jews. One we are Black ,though we are dark. Two We arent Jews thats ust a ridicules title that seperates us.
Somehow I found myself reading and researching this topic with great interest. I’m from Zimbabwe and for some reason my people share at least 80% of the Old Testament culture and tradition of the Israelites. When I read the Bible for the first time it was so easy for me to understand the law in Leviticus. I’m yet to ask my parents about how far and deep my roots go.
This is a joy to behold, the tribes starting to come together!
I too have wondered about Kenya and the Creator because some say KEN to say “yes” in Hebrew, I say Kahn as I speak ancient and not modern Hebrew, but there’s YAH the Holy Ones’ Name as a suffix: KENYA “Yes Yah”-
As to Zimbabwe, if memory serves me right, the Lemba tribe of South Africa(who are Hebrew and proved it through DNA)have an oral tradition of building a great monument or stone fort in Zimbabwe before they moved on to where they are now. Don’t be discouraged if locals of Zimbabwe insist their fore-fathers built it, the presence of this controversy is indicative of it’s merit for investigation. I will check back here periodically to learn of your progress. Shalam
peter lkayo, ten yrs ago, a Samburu friend of mine about told me that they have an exclamation of surprise, shock/joy that mentions Mt Sinai!
Jah Rastafari! 2000 yrs of Istory cyant be wiped away so easily!
yes i have friends who live in africa and they are great people for sure
You are doing a great thing by reminding all of us the true origins of our being. I’m a South African Zulu and the word Zulu actually translates ‘From above’, my mum always insisted that the tribe traveled from the North to settle in the South of Africa. If you look at some of the Zulu traditional clothing such as the crown that a woman wears when she is married you’ll find that it is similar to the one worn by the ancient Egyptians. I was so shocked one day when I was speaking Zulu when one Tanzanian man told me what I was speaking about. We definitely need someone to rewrite history and teach us all that has been hidden from us, by the Europeans.
Great read.
visit this site I read.
http://www.authenticjews.com
Wow this site is really great
This site suggested by Reuven is quite moving.
“And when the Queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon…she came to “PROVE” Solomon with hard questions…” 2 Chronicles 9:1 and 1 Kings 10:1. This is recorded in the Bible…
Now, does the COPY “PROVE” the ORIGINAL or does the ORIGINAL “PROVE” the COPY. Does the student test the teacher or does the teacher test the student. The Original was obviously in Africa, since the Queen of Sheba came to prove Solomon was a true of the noble African descendant. Modern Jews like all other tribes/races/peoplesare the descendants of those who migrated north from the cradle of civilisation.
you run things for now .I see you like al that bubblely kind of comment
Psalms 83 revealed that their is confederacy of nations who took oath to cut off Israel from being a NATION so that the name of Israel shall be no more..WE have all the reason to thank Jesus Christ the UMUEZEZAHAHA—THE MESSIAH
All those who have ears to hear ,hear My father had many other sons besides Solomon.I speak with the authority I am descended from David .King Solomon advised his son Menelik 1 st to take the Kings children with him back to Ethiopia with him.they did not stay in Ethiopia which was another Solomonic dynasty.Instead my fathers went to Mt Zion -a city built by David himself.
I love reggae and rasta culture, but just because you want to be jewish and claim to be by manipulating the bible doesn’t make you jewish. It’s okay, be proud of your own heritage but don’t try to exclude people from theirs. One Love.
Cameron
I refer you to Professor Shlomo Sands of Tel Aviv University or Read about Ben Gurion and what he said about Igbo’s. You can even contact Riz Khan of Aljazeera who interviewd Sands.
By the way Swazis, Ndebeles, Zulus, etc have the surname Dhlomo.
You do the Maths and figure it out.
I realize this is late, but just in case someone comes back>>
I know the Y-DNA E* has been covered for the Falasha (Beta Israel, ‘Black Jews’). I thought it important to also include the matrillineal lineage most dominant also.
Ethiopian Mitochondrial DNA Heritage: Tracking Gene Flow Across and Around the Gate of Tears
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1182106/
“Approximately 10 miles separate the Horn of Africa from the Arabian Peninsula at Bab-el-Mandeb (the Gate of Tears). Both historic and archaeological evidence indicate tight cultural connections, over millennia, between these two regions. High-resolution phylogenetic analysis of 270 Ethiopian and 115 Yemeni mitochondrial DNAs was performed in a worldwide context, to explore gene flow across the Red and Arabian Seas. Nine distinct subclades, including three newly defined ones, were found to characterize entirely the variation of Ethiopian and Yemeni L3 lineages. Both Ethiopians and Yemenis contain an almost-equal proportion of Eurasian-specific M and N and African-specific lineages and therefore cluster together in a multidimensional scaling plot between Near Eastern and sub-Saharan African populations.
“A majority of mtDNA lineages of Ethiopian Jews (Falasha or Beta Israel) derive from African-specific clades L0–L5 (Shen et al. 2004), including exact matches with Ethiopians sampled in the present study. Consistent with Y-chromosomal findings, this fact points to extensive admixture of Jews with the local population. A specific haplotype match in haplogroup (preHV)1—which is also widely spread in the Near East—between Ethiopian Jews and non-Jews is more problematic, because it is also possible that the non-Jews obtained the lineage from the Jews. This particular (preHV)1 haplotype, with a rare transversion at np 16305, (1) has not been detected, so far, among other Semitic populations of the Near East; whereas, (2) in Ethiopia, it occurs both among Cushitic and Semitic speakers; and, (3) in Ethiopian Jews, there are many sub-Saharan African lineages from haplogroups L0–L3. It is more likely, therefore, that the matching haplotype does not represent the incursion of Jewish maternal lineages into the Ethiopian gene pool but that this haplotype instead substantiates the extent of Ethiopian admixture in the Falasha population. Taken together, the influx of the elements of the Hebraic culture in the first centuries a.d. probably did not have a major impact on the genetic pool of Ethiopians, and the present-day Jews of Ethiopian descent probably assimilated genes from the local non-Jewish populations through conversion of the latter to Judaism. The other two episodes of intrusion of Semitic influence, related to contacts with southern Arabia, are weakly supported by our data. This is because, among the haplogroup N lineages present in high frequency in the Tigrais and other Ethiopian ethnic groups, only a few revealed close relationships with equivalent lineages present in southern Arabia.”
Great article. You cleared up a lot of confusion for me. The enemies (Europeans and Arabs) did not count on Arican people getting together. That is why they will continue to do everything in their power to divide us. We must be vigilant to prevent this from happening. We all, regardless of ethnicity, have a vested interest in restoring Africa’s glorious history. Our future depend on it. Our children must not grow up in darkness, thinking they are the scum of the earth when in reality they are the kings and queens. Thank you again for all your hard work towards our emancipation.