It has always fascinated me how those in Armstrongism that deal in prophecy porn need to make endless speculations as to who the so-called lost 12 tribes are. They need to establish who those 12 tribes are ignorer to prop up their delusional and outright lies concerning prophecy. After all these years of believing God revealed to Herbert Armstrong restored "truths" one would think they could make up their minds about this malarkey. While art is certainly fascinating reading at times, it has no relevance to any COG member in 2023, particularly when it comes to prophecy porn dished out by self-appointed false prophets of the Church of God.
But how dismissive of me to forget that God set into motion, as the universe was being created, for a latter-day prophet to arise in the early 21st Century that would be the channel for all revealed truth from God Almighty himself. Not so much from Jesus, but the Big Kahuna himself. Never before in the history of humanity would there be a man as magnificent and important as the Great Bwana to ever-changing numbers in Africa and the occasional 100 Caucasians? HWA, GTA, Herman Hoeh, Gerald Waterhouse, and the other prophecy shmucks of Armstrongism stand in awe of the Great Bwana Bob Mzungu Thiel. The best waffler the church has ever seen!
Anyway, that brings us to some of the latest hilarity out of Grover Beach in his article attempting to PROVE that Belgium is one of the lost 12 tribes.
The Great Bwana quotes one of the most prolific false prophets of Armstrongism, Herman Hoeh, as his source of authority, along with a former WCG member.
He writes:
Are there prophecies related to Belgium and Luxembourg?
The late evangelist Dr. Herman Hoeh wrote the following:
Asher “his bread shall be fat and he shall yield royal danties” (Gen. 49:20). This peculiar expression could have reference alone to Belgium and the kindred state Luxembourg. From Belgium have come the finest Flemish paintings, the royal tapestries which graced the halls of kings, fine cut diamonds, porcelain and Belgian lace. Belgium and Luxembourg are blessed above many another son of Jacob “Blessed be Asher above sons; let him be the favoured of his brethren, and let him dip his foot in oil” prosperity. Iron and brass shall by thy bars; and as thy days, so shall they riches increase. Because of uranium, Belgium’s prosperity will continue to grow. (The above rendering of Deut. 33:25 is the correct it is highly obscure.) (LOCATION OF THE TRIBES OF ISRAEL by Herman L Hoeh, ca. 1950s)
Because Hoeh recanted his Compendium of World History as inaccurate, why should anyone believe him about this other speculation in history and prophecy? False prophets need other false prophets to prop up their delusions.
He continues:
Retired teacher Bert Otten, who was once part of the old WCG, sent me a paper with his reasons why he feels that many in Belgium and Luxembourg are the descendants of the biblical tribe of Asher. He told me that I could edit and/or use what he sent in any way.
Otten lists 10 things that PROVE Belgians are of the tribe of Asher:
1. They are happy
2. They eat rich food
3. They make great delicacies:
a. Beer
b. chocolate
c. waffles and candies
d. tapestries, lace, and comic books
4. They are kind and friendly
5. There is a lot of iron and coal in their land
6. They make good things of brass (taken from the Congo after King Leopold tortured and killed millions of Congolese, but that's ok, they're of the tribe of Asher, and God said the Congo was theirs to exploit)
8. They are part of the Benelux nations and are all three descendants of biblical Leah (Belgium, Luxembourg, and Netherlands)
9. They are brave fighters
10. Belgians are neutral and peaceful
Once again, it may be fascinating reading but is ultimately irrelevant to one's walk with Christ.
Nevertheless, the Great Bwana has to thump his little chest and toot his little horn:
I should add that we have been to Belgium at least twice and Luxembourg at least once.
Yep, the Great Bwana is now an AUTHORITY on Belgium. I've been there many more times than he has, but that's another subject.
Crackpot Bob ends with this:
Knowing where various peoples have come from, help us better understand how the Bible teaches that various ones will be affected by end time events that are still to come to pass.
Anyone who is a follower of Christ has no need for this malarkey, as fascinating as it might be.
Gal. 3 Verses 28 to 29
[28] There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. [29] And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise.
14 comments:
The Swiss are friendlier than the Belgians, AND they make better chocolates!
Also, "Belgian" isn't a distinct nationality. It is French and Dutch people together in one very fractious country. What they have in common is that a majority of both peoples call themselves Roman Catholic, but actual church attendance is under 10 percent.
What is next?? -- Andorra, Monaco, and Lichenstein in Prophecy??
Once again , (ad nauseam) THERE IS NO DNA EVIDENCE for ANY of this nonsense!
Oh my they brought blessings to all whom they came in contact with. I guess those blessings still occur to this day according to Armstrongism.
If anyone could have dispelled Armstrongism from the perspective of someone deeply on the inside, it would have been David Jon Hill. Unfortunately, he passed away while he was doing exactly that. I no longer know where to find his partially completed memoirs, however, in one, he did describe how he and his classmates at AC played a tribal guessing game vis a vis European nations and tribes of Israel, based on similar names, words, and alleged culture. That is where this stuff all came from, and Thiel and others shamelessly repeat it. This was far from any sort of intellectual discussion based on research, genealogies, or history. All the "evidence" was purely circumstantial in nature, but was later presented as factual support for the nations of Western Europe being the lost ten tribes.
Hill likened it, iirc, to someone throwing darts, and then using the landing points as proofs or evidence. This, ladies and gentlemen, is your research team at Ambassador College, in action! Matt. 7:26-27.
The Belgians cannot be Asher because the Belgians are not descended from Abraham, Isaac or Jacob. The Belgians are Gentiles like the other similar peoples of Northwest Europe. Abraham's descendents are y chromosome haplogroup J. The Belgians are a portfolio of y chromosome haplogroups R, G and I mostly with traces of others. You can find PCA charts online that show the Belgians group with other Northwest Europeans. They are no where near the Jews genetically or other haplogroup J descendents of Abraham.
All people on earth are related. Some are just more distant than others. Like Paul says, we are all of one blood. We are the mutated descendents of Black Africans who left the African continent in waves long ago. In the non-African sphere, the migrants interbred with Neanderthals and Denisovans and some other mysterious people. Its all nicely mapped in our genomes for us to contemplate on a serene winter evening.
Scout
The 12 tribes are in the diaspora, defined as Israelites in Gentile nations - Greek James 1:1.
Tonto is rattled. The is DNA evidence for the Levite tribe.
8:37
The distinction among the 12 tribes has been lost. There are Jews in Diaspora but there are not 12 tribes in diaspora. Some Jews will claim a tribal affiliation but it is very tenuous. Some will cite the Cohen Modal Haplotype to claim descent from Aaron but the problem is that some Arabs also have the Cohen Modal Haplotype so it is not strictly determinative.
A common mistake that Armstrongists make is to believe that the Ashkenazi are the Jews in Diaspora. And since the Ashkenazi look very European, it makes the idea that the Northwest Europeans are descended from Israel seem plausible based on phenotype. It is plausible based on apperance that a Brit and and Ashkenazi might be racially the same (because the Ashkenazi is mostly European). It is not plausible that a Brit and a Mizrahi (Near Eastern) Jew are racially the same. This confusion is accompanied by a mistaken belief that Jews marry only within their "race" and are relatively pure. A recent study showed this breakdown for Ashkenazi Jews:
"The inferred ancestry profile for AJs (Ashkenazi Jews) was 5% Western Europe, 10% Eastern Europe, 30% Levant, and 55% Southern Europe". ("The Origins of Ashkenaz, Ashkenazic Jews, and Yiddish", from Frontiers in Genetics)
Jewish ancestry would appear in the breakdown above under Levant at 30%. Apparently, there was no further attempt in this study to analyze the Levant component. On PCA charts, Ashkenazi Jews locate very closely to Italians rather than other Near Eastern Jews such as the Mizrahi.
To provide a more comprehensible gauge, pre-colonial Native Americans were recently discovered to be around 30 percent European in ancestry. This means that early Native Americans were as much European as present Ashkenazi are Jewish. About 30 percent in both cases. Paradoxically, most people would not consider Native Americans to be Europeans but would consider Ashkenazi to be Jewish.
And, of course, Belgium is not one of the lost tribes of Israel. They are the wrong haplogroup, the wrong autosomal content, the wrong history and the wrong migration pattern. Plus there is no evidence that anybody like the Belgians ever lived in ancient times in the area of the Ten Tribes in Palestine. BI just doesn't fly. I would borrow a Trumpian term and call it a hoax but I don't think it was that malevolent. It is just a fantasy.
Scout
the problem is that some Arabs also have the Cohen Modal Haplotype so it is not strictly determinative
Why not? Anciently, many Cohens converted to Christianity or Islam.
10:35
Wikipedia says this about CMHC:
"One source of early confusion was the low resolution of the available tests. The Cohen Modal Haplotype (CMH), while frequent amongst Kohanim, also appeared in the general populations of haplogroups J1 and J2 with no particular link to the Kohen ancestry. These haplogroups occur widely throughout the Middle East and beyond.[20][21][1][2] Thus, while many Kohanim have haplotypes close to the CMH, a greater number of such haplotypes worldwide belong to people with no apparent connection to the Jewish priesthood."
The idea that CMH was spread naturally by breeding dinterelationships among people is unlikely. CMH occurs in J1 and J2. J1 and J2 split about 30,000 years ago. That is a ball park figure based on mutational change rate. I believe this means that CMH originated in the pre-30,000 year period before J1 and J2 split. This makes it impossible for it to be traced exclusively to the Cohen lineage from Aaron. But, alas, I am not an actual geneticist and can only advance some interpretations based on my amateur reading.
Scout
Years after I left the WCG, I made an objective and honest attempt to determine where the lost ten tribes are. Basically, they were assimilated. My studies revealed that numerous ones were assimilated into Judah. Some assimilation was orchestrated by captor nations, and of course we have the example of the Samaritans of Jesus' time. Anyone who has studied English history realizes that England was a melting pot long before America became one. Wilbur and Orville Wright set off a whole new level of mixing of the races by facilitating global travel.
Most likely, those who have dominant genes will be the surviving race, and will always be identifiable. Cultures change, and I don't spend a heck of a lot of time worrying that the culture I've enjoyed throughout my life span will no longer exist many years after I'm dead and gone. We who have enjoyable cultures are very fortunate, because some cultures leave little room for any sort of joy at all, and who is able to do what is simply a matter of the luck or lack of luck in the lottery known as birth.
" Anyone who has studied English history realizes that England was a melting pot long before"
Yep, not to mention the Angles, Saxons and Jutes arrived from across the North Sea. Even by AD 500 Germanic speakers seem to have settled deep into Britain.
Including the royal throne that have descended from Germany
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCKe_CCcgQw
I read recently that in reference to a passage in 2 Esdras (and later Josephus), Columbus believed that the New World was the fabled land of "Arzareth" that much of the ten tribes dispersed into. However, as far as I can tell, the source for that claim always comes back to a 1894 book about Columbus, and I do not know of a point in Columbus' own accounts where he said that (though I do not have an encyclopedic knowledge on that subject). If he did hold that belief, his treatment of the people he encountered suggests he didn't think much of their supposed storied ancestry.
In either case, Arzareth was imagined by writers as being a faraway place where the ten tribes, having NOT lost their identity, supposedly dwelled while keeping the law of Moses. That doesn't really square with BI or archaeology anyway and sounds very much like a "just-so" story.
Speaking of the Zeitgeist, a book called "Indian Origins and the Book of Mormon" reports that many Christians of Joseph Smith's time were wrestling with the fact that humans had existed in the land mass that would become known as North and South America, but that a Biblical historical narrative of humanity did not mention them at all.
The Book of Mormon postulates that Native Americans were descendants of a lost Tribe known as the Lamanites. The Lamanites were described as the antithesis of civilized, Christianized, white Nephites.
My take away from that is that others than ourselves have certainly struggled with the Bible''s Hebrew-centrism as science has continued to inform our fund of knowledge. Imagine the conceptual changes many may have been undergoing as scientific evidence transformed them from disc to globe world view! It must have been a great test of their faith, totally equal with that caused by the strange fossils which appeared shortly after the time of Charles Darwin.
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