Assyria and Germany in Anglo-Israelism

In Anglo-Israelism and some currents of U.S. Christian fundamentalism, the idea has been advanced that modern Germans are partly descended from the ancient Assyrians. This notion was entertained by Edward Hine, although it is incorrect as the native Germans are actually to this day referenced as Allemanni in the Syriac language. The only link to the region of Germany by Assyria are the expeditions into that region such as the ones by Prince Trebeta who colonized what is today Trier, which is annunciated by the Archbishops of Trier in records known as the Gesta Treverorum.

British Israelism

The idea can be traced to Edward Hine, an early proponent of British Israelism, deriving the Anglo-Saxons from the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel.^[1][2] The link between British Israelism, Assyrian, and Germanic ties is in a hypothetical sense by British Novelist Edward Hine comparing ancient Assyria and neighboring Israel to 20th century Britain and Germany. This is due to the relocation of the Ten Tribes of Israel, referenced as the House of Omri by the Assyrians, in which according to historical and archaeological data were relocated to Halah, Habor by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes, in conjunction with II Kings 18:11, before migrating into Europe. Biblical archaeologist and Christian historian E. Raymond Capt accords Biblical and historical data with tablets found at the Library of Ashurbanipal to conclude that European nobility developed from the Ten Tribes into separate dynasties, municipalities, and sovereign states with each tribe governing a particular region.^[3] There where at the time native people living in the land also. John Wilson, the intellectual founder of British Israelism, had considered that not only the people of Great Britain, but all the Germanic peoples were descended from the Ten Lost Tribes. Hine took a more particularist view, deciding that only the British nation fulfilled the prophecy for Israel — he acknowledged an ethnic affiliation between Britons and Germans, but thought this reflected what he considered was a close relationship between the ancient Israelites and their neighbors the Assyrians (who had taken the Ten Lost Tribes into captivity in Assyria). Likewise, Britain and Germany's status as two great powers of the modern age he considered reflective of the ancient glories of the Kingdom of Israel and of Assyria. So there were two original competing views as to the relationship between the Germans and British-Israel; either the British people, alone, were identified with the Tribes of Israel (Edward Hine) or they included the Germans (John Wilson) and other European peoples (including the Dutch and Scandinavians).^[4] Hine maintained that only the Ten Tribes of Israel were included within the British race and excluded the Continental Teutonic or German peoples, who he instead believed descended from Assyrians not Israelites.^[5] Hine believed all the tribes of Israel settled in Britain only, with Manasseh who became the Americans (who mostly descended from British stock). Hine had identified the Ten Tribes as being together in Britain in that Ephraim were the drunkards and ritualists, Reuben the farmers, Dan the mariners, Zebulan the lawyers and writers, Asher the soldiers etc., or that these tribes were regional or local people in Britain.^[6] Hine's particularist view was received with some hostility by other British Israelites, who maintained that other Europeans descended from the lost tribes of Israel, not solely Britain.^[7]

Hine believed that all of the ancient peoples mentioned in the Bible must also be present in the modern world, in order for the prophecies concerning them to be fulfilled. If a people was "lost" to the ages, it meant simply that the people must have migrated to a new region, changed their ethnonym, and forgotten their history. Hine considered the Assyrians as such a "lost" people (unlike for example, the Egyptians), and he made no mention in his writings of the modern Assyrian community in the Middle East — a community that was largely unknown to Europe in his time. Although Assyria is portrayed as one of the great enemies of Israel in the Bible, Hine took pains to explain that he did not consider Germany to be an enemy of Britain, and his writings do not betray any anti-German feelings. In his Forty Seven Identifications, he did admit ‘The Germans are not our enemies, and there is evidence to show that they could not become our enemies’.^[8] Later writers in his tradition, however, have often set Germany in the Biblical role of Assyria as an enemy to Britain.

British Israelism often compares the militarism of the German Empire with that of the Neo-Assyrian Empire as narrated in the Bible, by analogy establishing Britain, as the threatened party, with the Kingdom of Israel. After World War II, the comparison was also extended to the supposed brutality towards the Jewish population.^[9]

Precedents and early sources

The Assyria-Germany connection has an early precedent in Jerome, who compared the Germanic invaders of his day to the threats to the Kingdom of Israel described in the Bible, quoting Psalms 83:8, "Assur also is joined with them":^[10]

The whole country between the Alps and the Pyrenees, between the Rhine and the Ocean, has been laid waste by hordes of Quadi, Vandals, Sarmatians, Alans, Gepids, Herules, Saxons, Burgundians, Allemanni and—alas! for the commonweal!—even Pannonians. For "Assur also is joined with them."

The comparison of the statement to the Pslams 83:8, "Assur also is joined with them: they have holpen the children of Lot. Selah." of letter CXXIII to Psalms 83:8 in relation to "threats to the Kingdom of Israel" is erroneous as it states that Assur joined to help the children of Lot which is the nephew of Abraham, one of the patriarchs of Israel.

The idea has also some backing in German legend, for example the Gesta Treverorum (a 12th-century German medieval chronicle) makes Trebeta son of Ninus the founder of Trier.^[11] This legend of Trebeta as having founded Trier is also found in Godfrey of Viterbo's Pantheon (1185) and several other German chronicles of the 12th or 13th century, including the works of Sigebert of Gembloux.^[12] The legend is also found cited in compendiums of historical sources from later periods, for example Gottfried Leibniz's Scriptures rerum Brunsvicensium (1710) and the Anthologia veterum latinorum epigrammatum et poematum (1835).^[13]

Also of medieval date is the inscription at the facade of the Red House of Trier market,

ANTE ROMAM TREVIRIS STETIT ANNIS MILLE TRECENTIS.

PERSTET ET ÆTERNA PACE FRVATVR. AMEN.

("1,300 years before Rome, Trier stood / may it stand on and enjoy eternal peace, amen.") being mentioned in the Codex Udalrici of 1125. A 1559 painting of Trebeta as the founder of Trier was destroyed in a 1944 bombing raid. Leonardy (1877)^[14] provides an epitaph dedicated to Trebeta by his son Hero in German hexameters.

Revision of Assyrian extent of territory

Adherents of the Assyria-Germany connection often revise the extent of land the Assyrians controlled (see Neo-Assyrian Empire). British Israelites, for example, who equate Assyria to Germany claim that the Neo-Assyrian Empire extended to the Black Sea region and further north.^[15] Mainstream historians, by contrast, believe land controlled by the Assyrians during the Neo-Assyrian Empire did not stretch that far, but only reached into southern, south western and north eastern Anatolia, bordering Armenia. There is no historical evidence that the Assyrians crossed the Caucasus into Europe in Assyrian records of the time, and the furthest extent of their conquests would have been the southern borders of the Caucasus and the south eastern edge of the Black sea.^[16] However, the Persian Achaemenid Empire, which took control over the Assyrians and Babylonians in the 6th century BC. did extend its territory to the Black Sea and north-west into Thrace. British Israelites, however, maintain that this extended territory already existed before the Persians, often quoting as evidence the Periplus of Pseudo-Scylax, which lists Assyria as having already extended to the Black Sea region.^[17] British Israelites also cite Pliny the Elder, who mentioned a tribe dwelling around the north-western regions of the Black Sea (Romania or Ukraine) in the 1st century AD called the Assyriani, who they believe were Assyrians.^[18]

Taking the legends of Trebeta as having founded Trier in Germany in 2053 BC (1300 years before the establishment of Rome in 753 BC) as literal fact, and revising the extent of the Neo-Assyrian Empire into south-western parts of Europe, British Israelites believe that the ancient Assyrians had a vast territory.^[19] To further corroborate this belief, British Israelites often quote from the Austrian Chronicle of 95 Seigneurs (see below).

Jews deported by Assyrians to Germany

British Israelites who adhere to the Assyria-German identification believe that a small portion of Jews were deported to Germany by the Assyrians.^[20] They cite II Kings 18: 13 which notes that the Assyrian king Sennacherib sacked several cities of Judah and captured several Jewish inhabitants. This deportation has been verified by archeology, since an ancient Assyrian prism records Sennacherib deported a population of Judah (see Taylor and Sennacherib Prisms). This population of Judah was deported (with the House of Israel) to the Medes but British Israelites believe that the Jews and Israelites who were deported by the Assyrians to the Medes, did not stay there, but migrated over time into parts of Europe.^[21]

The 14th-century Austrian Chronicle of 95 Seigneurs is usually cited by British Israelites, as it purports to trace an early Jewish settlement in Germany or Austria. The Chronicle connects the Dukes of Austria with the Jews rather than the Assyrians but states that Central Europe became to accept the Jewish faith or Jewish customs from 708-704 BC. British Israelites provide an answer for this: they believe since the Assyrians had long controlled parts of Europe (especially Germany) that the Germans or Austrians became to accept Jewish customs and faith in the 8th century BC because Sennacherib (who captured several cities in Judah) had deported its Jewish inhabitants into Eastern Europe along the Danube River, eventually reaching Austria and Germany.^[22] The Chronicle lists 'Jewish Kings' who began from 708-704 BC during which a duke called Gennan converted to Judaism. Consequently, this Jewish population intermarried with the local rulers in the regions of Austria and Hungary, the pagans were subdued and the whole country was Jewish until c. 227 CE.^[23]

Often cited to support these theories, is the legend of Judaesaptan.^[24] According to the Jewish Virtual Library, this was a legendary Jewish kingdom, which several thousands of years ago sat in Austria or central Europe; it first appeared in writing in Gottfried Hagen's chronicle Reimchronik (1270).^[25]

Wolfgang Lazius in the 16th century attempted to find the remains of the kingdom but was unsuccessful.^[26]

Anglo-Saxons not Germanic

British Israelites who are proponents of Hine's German-Assyria connection do not believe that the Anglo-Saxons were Germanic, but instead of Scythian heritage, who ultimately descended from the ancient Israelites.^[27] Hine pointed out that the Anglo-Saxons only spoke a Germanic language, and that the term 'German' was an exonym and that the Saxons were distinct to the other continental Germanic tribes.^[28][29] Hine believed that the Anglo-Saxons were only in Germany for a short time as part of their migration to the appointed 'Islands' (which he identified as Britain) as their final resting place, as told where the Israelites would be resettled in Isaiah 24: 15; 42: 4; 49: 1; 51: 5 and Jeremiah 31: 10.^[30][31]

Worldwide Church of God

Herbert W. Armstrong in Chapter 5 of his Mystery of Ages (1985), "The Assyrians settled in central Europe, and the Germans, undoubtedly, are, in part, the descendents of the ancient Assyrians." (p. 183). In this, Armstrong draws upon the opinions of Herman L. Hoeh, published in his 1963 Compendium of World History.^[32]

Such suggestions are informed by Jerome's simile with Psalms 83:8.^[33]

Hoeh (1963) draws on Verstegan (1605) and Johannes Turmair (1526) to conclude that Deutsch really derives from Tuisto whom he in turn identifies with Shem:

Tuitsch or Tuisto: Chief of thirty-two dukes. Noah gave him all the land between the Don River and the Rhine or what was called Grossgermania. This is the beginning of the 'neolithic' settlement of Europe. Tuitsch is, according to all ancient German commentaries and chronicles, a son of Noah. But which son? Noah adopted Tuitsch's children as his own. The ancient Germans understood the name Tuitsch to be the title 'Teacher.' He was therefore the great patriarch of his family who taught the divine will to his children. Tuitsch is the father of Mannus (who is the Assyrian Ninus). The son of Mannus, Trebeta, is the same man who is called the son of Ninus in classical writers. The son of Mannus or Ninus — Trebeta — built Trier, the first town of Germany. Since the Bible calls this Ninus (who built Nineveh), Asshur, Tuitsch is therefore Shem! (Hoeh 1963 vol. 2 ch. 2)

Controversy

As with Anglo-Israelism itself, proposed German-Assyrian connections enjoy no empirical support and are not current among mainstream historians, anthropologists, archaeologists or historical linguists.

See also

• British Israelism

References

• Craig White, The Great German Nation: Origins and Destiny, ISBN 1-4343-2549-0

External links

British Israelism

• Alan Campbell, The Remnant of Judah Revealed in Germany (part one), (part two)

US Christian fundamentalism

• Kelly Marshall, The Origins of Assyria and Germany, Exit & Support Network (2004)