The theory that the Pashtun or "ethnic Afghans" are descended from the ancient Israelites—more precisely, from the perspective of Jewish history the Lost Ten Tribes of Israel— has a longstanding basis as a tradition among the Pashtun themselves, was widely accepted by 19th century British scholars, and has been accepted by some reasonably recent and prominent individuals such as Itzhak Ben-Zvi, second President of Israel. However, contemporary anthropologists continue to debate this, putting forth an eastern Iranian people relation to the other peoples of the Iranian plateau based upon strong genetic and linguistic evidence, in addition to other possibilities such as admixture with invaders and groups that migrated to the region now inhabited by the Pashtuns.
Whether or not the Pashtuns are in fact derived from one ethnic group is unknown, as no comprehensive study of them as a whole group has ever been completed.
The claim of Afghans to be the Bani Israel (Children of Israel) is not founded on oral tradition alone. It is supported by ancient monuments, old inscriptions, manuscripts, and historical works, many in the public domain, and many others in private collections. Of recent report is the 12th century Hebrew cemetery a mile and a half from the base of the Tower of Jam in the middle of a very desolate region of Western Afghanistan. [New York Times Magazine, 42, Aug. 25, 2002]
One of the most ancient manuscripts available is Rauza ul Albab fi Tawarikh-ul-Akabir wal Ansab – The Garden of the Learned in the History of Great Men and Genealogies – by Abu Suleman Daud bin Abul Fazal Muhammad Albenaketi which was written in 1317 AD. The author in his Introduction explains that ever since the times of Moses the ancestors of Afghans have had to face great hardships. They were expelled from place to place and exterminated. Their ancient ancestors were sacked more than once and carried into captivity. In Chapter I a detailed history of Yacub (Jacob) is given and in Chapter II the genealogies of the Afghan tribes are further traced.
Bukhtawar Khan in his most valuable universal history Mirat-ul-Alam – The Mirror of the World – gives a vivid account of the journeys of the Afghans from the Holy Land to Ghor, Ghazni, and Kabul. Similarly Hafiz Rahmat bin Shah Alam in his Khulasat-ul-Ansab and Fareed-ud-Din Ahmad in Risala-i-Ansab-i-Afghana provide the history of the Afghans and deal with their genealogies.
Two of the most famous historical works on the subject are Tarikh-i-Afghana – History of the Afghans – by Niamatullah, which was translated by Bernard Dork in 1829, and Tarikh-i-Hafiz Rahmatkhani, by Hafiz Muhammad Zadeek which he wrote in 1770. These books deal with the early history of the Afghans, their origin and wanderings in general. They particularly discuss the Yusuf Zyes (the Yusefzai, "Sons of Joseph") and their occupation of Kabul, Bajoor, Swat, and Peshawar.
Additional authors Syed Jamal-ud-Din Afghani (Tarikh-i-Afghana, the History of Afghans), and Syed Abdul Jabbar Shah (Mun'ameen-i-Bani Israel, MS.), ex-Ruler of Swat, discuss the question exhaustively and come to the conclusion that the Afghans represent the Lost Tribes of Israel as viewed from the perspective of the Jewish/Western world.
If we turn to Anglo-Western writers during the time of the British Empire we find that they also have come to the same conclusion. The first to reach such is Henry Vansittart. In a letter which appeared in Indian Researches he commented on the Israelitish descent of the Afghans. He expressed the opinion that the claim of the Afghans to be Bani Israel are more than justified given his own observations of their indigenous traditions. [Indian Researches, 1788, Vol. 2: 69]
Sir Alexander Brunes in his Travels into Bokhara, which he published in 1835, speaking of the Afghans said: "The Afghans call themselves Bani Israel, or the children of Israel, but consider the term Yahoodi, or Jew, to be one of reproach. They say that Nebuchadnezzar, after the overthrow of Israel, transplanted them into the towns of Ghore near Bamean and that they were called after their Chief Afghana… they say that they lived as Israelites till Khalid summoned them in the first century of the Mohammadans… Having precisely stated the traditions and history of the Afghans I see no good reason for discrediting them… the Afghans look like Jews and the younger brother marries the widow of the elder. The Afghans entertain strong prejudices against the Jewish nation, which would at least show that they have no desire to claim – without just cause – a descent from them. [Sir Alexander Brunes, Travels into Bokhara, Vol. 2:139-141.]
Brunes was again in 1837 sent as the first British Envoy to the Court of Kabul. For some time he was the guest of King Dost Muhammad Khan. He questioned the King about the descent of the Afghans from the Israelites. The King replied that "his people had no doubt of that, though they repudiated the idea of being Jews".
William Moorcroft traveled during 1819 to 1825 through various countries adjoining India, including Afghanistan. "The Khaibarees," he says, "are tall and have a singularly Jewish cast of features." At Push Kyun, within Afghan territory, he came across a very old copy of the Old Testament in Hebrew. [Moorcroft, Travels in Himalayan Provinces of Hindustan and the Punjab; in Ladakh and Kashmir, in Peshawar, Kabul, Kunduz and Bokhara, 12]
J.B. Frazer in his book, An Historical and Descriptive Account of Persia and Afghanistan, which he published in 1843, says: "According to their own tradition they believe themselves to be descendants from the Hebrews… they preserved the purity of their religion until they met with Islam." [J.B. Frazer, A Historical and Descriptive Account of Persia and Afghanistan, 298]
J.P. Ferrier wrote his History of the Afghans in 1858. It was translated by Capt. W. M. Jesse. He too was disposed to believe that the Afghans represented the Ten Tribes of Israel. In support of his view he recorded, among others, a very significant fact: “When Nadir Shah marching to the conquest of India arrived at Peshawar, the chief of the tribe of Yoosoof Zyes (Sons of Joseph) presented him with a Bible written in Hebrew and several other articles that had been used in their ancient worship and which they had preserved. These articles were at once recognized by the Jews who followed the camp.” – J.P. Ferrier, History of the Afghans, 4.
George Moore published his famous work The Lost Tribes in 1861. He gave numerous facts to prove that these tribes are traceable to the Afghans. After giving details of the character of the wandering Israelites, he said: "And we find that the very natural character of Israel reappear in all its life and reality in countries where people call themselves Bani Israel and universally claim to be the descendants of the Lost Tribes. The nomenclature of their tribes and districts, both in ancient Geography, and at the present day, confirms this universal natural tradition. Lastly, we have the route of the Israelites from Media to Afghanistan and India marked by a series of intermediate stations bearing the names of several of the tribes and clearly indicating the stages of their long and arduous journey." [George Moore, The Lost Tribes]
Moore goes on to say: "Sir William Jones, Sir John Malcolm and the missing Chamberlain, after full investigation, were of the opinion that the Ten Tribes migrated to India, Tibet, and Cashemire [Kashmir] through Afghanistan." [George Moore, The Lost Tribes]
Moore has mentioned only three eminent writers on the subject. But reference can also be made to General Sir George Macmunn (Afghanistan from Darius to Amanullah, 215), Col. G.B. Malleson (The History of Afghanistan from the Earliest Period to the outbreak of the War of 1878, 39), Col. Failson, (History of Afghanistan, 49), George Bell (Tribes of Afghanistan, 15), E. Balfour (Encyclopedia of India, article on Afghanistan), Sir Henry Yule (Encyclopædia Britannica, article on Afghanistan), and the Hon. Sir George Rose (Rose, The Afghans, the Ten Tribes and the Kings of the East, 26). They, one and all, independently came to the same conclusion. Another, Major H.W. Bellew, went on a political mission to Kandahar and published his impressions in his Journal of a Mission to Kandahar, 1857-8. He then wrote in 1879 his book Afghanistan and Afghans. In 1880 he was sent, once again on another mission to Kabul, and in the same year he delivered two lectures before the United Services Institute at Simla: "A New Afghan Question, or "Are the Afghans Israelites?" and "Who are the Afghans?" He then published another book: The Races of Afghanistan. Finally he collected all his facts in An Enquiry into the Ethnography of Afghanistan, which was published in 1891.
In this work he mentions Killa Yahoodi ("Fort of the Jews") (H.W. Bellew, An Enquiry into the Ethnography of Afghanistan, 34), as being the name of the eastern boundary of their country, and also speaks of Dasht-i-Yahoodi ("Jewish plain") (ibid., 4), a place in Mardan District. He concludes: "The Afghan’s accounts of Jacob and Esau, of Moses and the Exodus, of the Wars of the Israelites with the Amalekites and conquest of Palestine, of the Ark of the Covenant and of the election of Saul to the Kingdom, etc., etc., are clearly founded on the Biblical records, and clearly indicate a knowledge of the Old Testament, which if it does not prove the presence of the Christians at least corroborates their assertion that the Afghans were readers of the Pentateuch up to the time of the appearance of Mohammad." (Ibid., 191)
Note, it is well understood and undisputed that there have never been Christian communities in Afghanistan pre- or for many centuries after the dawn of Islam.
Thomas Ledlie wrote an article in the Calcutta Review, which he subsequently elaborated and published in two volumes. He expressed his views on the subject very clearly: "The Europeans always confuse things, when they consider the fact that the Afghans call themselves Bani Israel and yet reject their Jewish descent. Indeed, the Afghans discard the very idea of any descent from the Jews. They, however, yet claim themselves to be of Bani Israel." [Thomas Ledlie, More Ledlian, Calcutta Review, January, 1898]
Ledlie goes on to explain: "Israelites, or the Ten Tribes, to whom the term Israel was applied – after their separation from the House of David, and the tribe of Judah, which tribe retained the name of Judah and had a distinct history ever after. These last alone are called Jews and are distinguished from the Bani Israel as much in the East as in the West." [Ibid., 7]
Among more contemporary writers Dr. Alfred Edersheim says: "Modern investigations have pointed to the Nestorians and latterly, with almost convincing evidence (so far as it is possible) to the Afghans as descendants from the Lost Tribes." [Dr. Alfred Edersheim, The Life and Times of Jesus, the Messiah, 15]
Sir Thomas Holditch in his The Gates of India says: "But there is one important people (of whom there is much more to be said) who call themselves Bani Israel, who claim a descent from Cush and Ham, who have adopted a strange mixture of Mosaic Law in Ordinances in their moral code, who (some sections at least) keep a feast which strongly accords with the Passover,… and for whom no one has yet been able to suggest any other origin than the one they claim, and claim with determined force, and these people are the overwhelming inhabitants of Afghanistan." – Sir Thomas Holditch, The Gates of India, 49.
There are many additional references, recorded incidents, manuscripts and artifacts related to the Hebraic history of the Pashtuns for the dedicated objective researcher who seeks them out.
In his 1957 classic The Exiled and the Redeemed, Itzhak Ben-Zvi, second President of Israel, writes that Hebrew migrations into Afghanistan began, "with a sprinkling of exiles from Samaria who had been transplanted there by Shalmaneser, King of Assyria (719 BC). From the recurrent references in the Book of Esther to the "one hundred and twenty seven dominions" of King Ahasuerus, the deduction is permissible that eastern Afghanistan was among them." [The Exiled and the Redeemed, 176]
Ben-Zvi continues, "The Afghan tribes, among whom the Jews have lived for generations, are Moslems who retain to this day their amazing tradition about their descent from the Ten Tribes. It is an ancient tradition, and one not without some historical plausibility. A number of explorers, Jewish and non-Jewish, who visited Afghanistan from time to time, and students of Afghan affairs who probed into literary sources, have referred to this tradition, which was also discussed in several encyclopedias in European languages. The fact that this tradition, and no other, has persisted among these tribes is itself a weighty consideration. Nations normally keep alive memories passed by word of mouth from generation to generation, and much of their history is based not on written records but on verbal tradition. This was particularly so in the case of the nations and the communities of the Levant. The people of the Arabian Peninsula, for example, derived all their knowledge of an original pagan cult, which they abandoned in favor of Islam, from such verbal tradition. So did the people of Iran, formerly worshipers of the religion of Zoroaster; the Turkish and Mongol tribes, formerly Buddhists and Shamanists; and the Syrians who abandoned Christianity in favor of Islam. Therefore, if the Afghan tribes persistently adhere to the tradition that they were once Hebrews and in course of time embraced Islam, and there is not an alternative tradition also existent among them, the matter certainly deserves careful and critical examination." [The Exiled and the Redeemed]
Ben-Zvi continues to give first hand Jewish witness accounts of the Pashtuns, and other interesting information.
Today, one of the most pre-eminent living Western researchers in this area is Rabbi Avichail of Israel.
