lar communities could hold descen-
dants of the lost tribes," says Rabbi
Bergstein. He suggests that a simple
reading of a prophecy in Ezekiel indi-
cates that the descendants of Reuven
will come back at the time of the
Messiah.
As Jacobovici put more miles behind
him, his convictions about the authen-
ticity of his findings strengthened. He
felt he was building reasons to believe
the prophecy in Isaiah that reads:
"And it shall come to pass on
that day that the Lord will set His
hand again the second time to
recover the remnant of His people
... and will assemble the dispersed
of Israel and gather together the
scattered of Judah from the four
corners of the earth."
When Jacobovici hired his staff for
Quest for the Lost Tribes of Israel, he
looked for skeptics, people who
would question and analyze the direc-
tions of the project. Former Michigan
resident and Hillel Day School alum-
nus Mark Leuchter, who is working
on his doctoral degree in biblical his-
tory and religion at the University of
Toronto, held on to his skepticism as
chief researcher.
"I think the value of the film is
that it asks important questions and
makes people think," says Leuchter,
whose earlier work for Jacobovici was
on the film Hollywoodism: Jews,
Movies & the American Dream. "I'm a
big supporter of the movie, but my
interpretation of what was filmed is
different," he says.
Leuchter, for instance, believes
that the speech patterns described

what is described in the Bible. In the
capital of Uzbekistan, they found hid-
den items with what they describe as
Hebrew lettering. Afghanistan travels
came up with a stone that had letter-
ing in a script that had been com-
monly used for many centuries by
Jewish people.
"Most of these people today are
not living as Jews," Jacobovici says.
"They are living as Muslims or
Christians, and I think they're living
as Muslims and Christians because
they are Jews. They lost their contact
with the Jewish people and Torah and
could have become Hindus or
Buddhists, but they didn't.
"They only adopted Christianity
or Islam," he asserts, "because those
are monotheistic, and both the Koran
and the Christian Bible have stories
from the Torah in them. When I
meet [these people] today, they're
practicing a different religion, but
some have realized this is not their
[true] religion and have started to
return to Judaism."
Those who believe in the possibili-
ty of finding the so-called lost tribes
believe that locating them would be
associated with the coming of the
Messiah. Rabbi Chaim Moshe
Bergstein of Bais Chabad of
Farmington Hills concurs.
Rabbi Bergstein believes that Judaic
teachings suggest the possibility of
finding groups of descendants. He
bases this conclusion on post-talmudic
legends and the writings of Rabbi Ibn
Attar (1655-1733), who appears to
have visited one of these groups.
"There are many communities in
remote areas where little contact is
made with outsiders, and these insu-

ANCIENT MYSTERY

on page 84

........

A community of Jewish cohanim celebrate the Torah in Djerba, Tunisia.

TWELVE TRIBES

from opposite page

A map, circa 1000-993 B. C.E.,
showing the 12 tribes of Israel
united under David Afier the death
of Solomon, there was a split. The
tribes of Judah and Benjamin formed
the Kingdom of Juclizh in the south.
The Assyrians eventually conquered
the Kingdom of Israel in the north,
sending what came to be known as
the 10 losttribes into exile.

In the end, the Israelite tribes
came together as a crystallized
national-territorial entity only with-
in the framework of a monarchy,
during the period of the early kings.
The division of the nation by
King Solomon into 12 districts,
each of which was to support the
royal household for a
DAVID'S KINGDOM
month in the year, aided in
C. 1000 - 993 B.C.E.
establishing the traditional
ISRAELITE TERRITORY
number of 12 tribes. But
UNDER ISRAELITE RULE
with the monarchical goal
UNDER VASSAL TREATY
of weakening tribal con-
sciousness in favor of terri-
=MI EXTENT OF
DAVID'S KINGDOM
torial and monarchical
organization, the districts
may not have corresponded exactly
to the older tribal divisions.
After Solomon's death, the coun-
try split into two, with the tribes of
Judah and Benjamin in the south
in the Kingdom of Judah loyal to
the House of David and the rest of
the tribes in the north in the
Kingdom of Israel ruled by a suc-
cession of dynasties.
As the result of the invasion of the
Assyrian kings in the eighth century
B.C.E., members of the 10 northern
tribes in the Kingdom of Israel were
killed, enslaved or scattered.
Nebuchadnezzar exiled a large sec-
tion of the population of the south-
return will trigger Armageddon.
ern Kingdom of Judah to Babylon in
Throughout the Middle Ages and
the sixth century B.C.E., but the
through recent times, there have
remnants of the southern two tribes
been claims regarding the existence
were allowed to return to their home-
of the 10 lost tribes. There is hardly
land 50 years later. Their descendants
a people — from the Japanese to
formed the nucleus of the Jewish peo-
the British to Native Americans to
ple (the religion Judaism taking its
the Afghans --- who have not been
name from the tribe of Judah).
suggested, and hardly a place.
Yet, while the tribes disappeared as
In historic fact, it is probably most
separate entities as the nation consoli-
likely that some members of the ten
dated under the kings and then were
lost tribes remained in the land of
exiled, the notion of 12 tribes lingered.
Israel, joining the tribes of Judah,
From the moment of their exile, the
where their descendants long pre-
return of the 10 lost tribes has been
served their identity among the
associated with apocalyptic events.
Jewish population. Most were proba-
The prophecies of Isaiah,
bly assimilated into foreign popula-
Jeremiah and above all Ezekiel kept
tions. As for the return of the ten lost
alive the belief that the 10 lost
tribes, the prophets may have been
tribes had maintained a separate
referring in a broader sense to the
existence and that the time would
reunification of the Jewish people in
come when they would be rejoined
an undivided kingdom of Israel, as
with their brethren, the descendants
once existed under King David.
of the exile of Judah to Babylon.
In any case, the mystery — and
Many Orthodox Jews await their
the search — continues.
return as a sign of the prophesied
coming of the Messiah. Christians
— Compiled from articles in
associate the return of the 10 lost
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia,
tribes with the "second coming" of
The Universal Jewish Encyclopedia
Christ, and many believe their
and Encyclopedia Judaica.

6/18
1999

Detroit Jewish News

83