Jews, Jews Everywhere

[Solon]

In 1644, an Jew named Antonio de Montezinos claimed to have discovered a group of Jewish native Americans living in modern-day Ecuador. These Jews, who claimed descent from the tribe of Reuben, observed Jewish rites, such as the Shema prayer. De Montezinos told his account to a notable Rabbi named Menasseh ben Israel, who published the account, entitled The Hope of Israel, in 1650 (in Spanish). It was translated into English that same year.

David Katz has written a few interesting pieces on the scattering of the Jews throughout Asia and, in this case, America.

His chapter (pp. 107-122) in this book, The Jews and the Expansion of Europe to the West, 1450 to 1800 by Paolo Bernardini, Norman Fiering

http://books.google.com/books?id=m0J...iyjo#PPA108,M1

begins with Antonio de Montezinos and quickly transitions to The Book of Mormon, both of which claimed that parts of the lost tribes of Israel had turned up in the Americas.

In addition, Katz wrote an article (available on JSTOR) called "The Chinese Jews and the Problem of Biblical Authority in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-
Century England" in The English Historical Review, vol. 105, no. 4.

Apparently, there had long been stories of Jews in China - early in the common era, but well documented from the time of Marco Polo (who claims to have met some Jews on his trip to China). During the 18th and 19th centuries, European scholars thought these Jews might have more ancient versions of the scriptures and wanted to make contact with them in order to compare.

In the end, the contact with the Chinese Jews never really worked out, and the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the 1940s revealed that European Jewish scripture had hardly changed at all since the 1st century CE.

Katz also mentions a strong Jewish community in India, called the Cochin or Malabar Jews. It's unclear when the earliest Jews came to India. The oldest evidence, a legal document inscribed on a pair of copper plates, is dated to ca. 1000 CE.
http://www.bh.org.il/Communities/Archive/Cochin.asp

This board has already discussed the Lemba, but I put the link here for the sake of completeness.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/israel/familylemba.html

You can also read a NY Times article on the Lemba: "DNA Backs a Tribe's Tradition of Early Descent From the Jews." Written by Nicholas Wade. May 9, 1999 (page 2)

Apparently, Jesus did have many other sheep, not of the Judaean fold, but it's unclear (with the exception of the Book of Mormon account) when these groups of Jews emigrated, although the groups themselves often claim quite ancient origins (e.g. the Lemba claim to have left during the time of Solomon).

I found it very interesting the way Katz connected the search for lost tribes of Jews with the idea that scriptures had become corrupted. I would dare say that this is a Book of Mormon mini-theme: the connections between separate witnesses, the plates of brass preserving the Nephites while the descendants of Mulek lost their language and their beliefs, the importance of record keeping, abridging, and preserving holy texts, etc.

[Mormon Red Death]

The book of Mormon is true... Take that Seattle Ute!