Reflections on the Purity, or Otherwise, of the Bene Israel Race in India

Jacob Bapuji Israel

1918

“Is the Bene-Israel in India a pure Jew by descent” is the question often asked and discussed. There has been considerable literature on the subject especially by aliens, even such as can claim little knowledge on the subject. The general trend of the writings has been to throw more or less veiled, but, at the same time clearly perceptible hints that the Bene-Israel is a mixed race as compared with the other Israel races in the world.

This looks very much like a story I have heard. “A King met a tiger in a jungle and they happened to become great friends. The King brought the tiger home and showed the pictures in his palace. Amongst them was a painting in which a man was shown riding a tiger and hacking him to pieces. The King said ‘look at the brave man! he has subdued a tiger and is cutting him to pieces.’ The tiger said ‘ah sire, but, the picture is drawn by a man. Had a tiger been the artist the scales would certainly have been turned.’”

The same is the case with these writers. They do not find it in their interest to admit the Bene-Israel in India to the same purity of race as is allowed to the other Israel races in the world.

It is now my desire to draw the picture from the tiger’s, or I should say the Bene-Israel’s point of view, and I hope my writing proves effective and convincing, and places such an important, imprudent, and odious controversy beyond the pale of recognition by Society in general, especially such as calls itself learned and civilized.

The question of prime importance is whether there do really exist different races amongst human beings. I emphatically say No. Is a tiger living in the Jungles of Thana considered to be of a race different from a tiger that has made the Sunderbans of Bengal his home? Each has his own size, hue, habits and other qualities due to environments, climate and food available, but, these do not make the races different. They are every whit the same. So is the case with man. A European white like snow and with the highest developments acquired through environments and opportunities available is not a different being from an Ethiopian belonging to the darkest regions of Africa. The flesh, blood, veins, bones, brain and other organs are exactly the same. On joining hands the two prove prolific and with often a stronger stamina [ . . . ] the progeny than what the parents have the honour to possess. Is it possible then to suppose that they are two different races? Is it conceivable that they were born of two different kinds of ancestral germs at the creation?

It may be that one has greater resources at his disposal than the other. But, this does in no way differentiate the races. It is merely a degree to which one chooses to rise or has opportunities to rise in the grades of comforts of life. Offered the same opportunities a negro has shown abilities as good as a man from the heart of civilization. Under the israelitish and Mussalman system of emancipation and freedom afforded to slaves there have been numerous instances of Africans who have evinced remarkable ability commonly considered exclusively the privilege of the so called white races. Remember Malik Amber, the Abyssinian protector of the Mussalman kingdom of Ahmednagar; bring to mind his ingenious revenue system on which is based the present revenue system of the Deccan, and all ideas of a real differentiation of races must immediately vanish.

All human beings existing in the world are, therefore, sons of the same ancestors and belong to one and the same human family.

The question then is what are races as they exist at present amongst human beings? They are to my mind, nothing but a vanity of vanities. Two brothers born of same parents have formed different races consequent on migration, a variety of faith, religion and habits, and more particularly a spirit of usurpation, jealousy and emulation. Race formation is thus a mere circumstantial accident, a state of Babel, a result of mutual enmities and differences. It would seem they are a curse willed by God for the automatic punishment of sin and the consequent survival of the fittest.

Let us now see what actually happens by the formation of races. One race calls itself higher than the other with the result it hath pleased Providence to show us in the past 4 or 5 years, viz. bloodshed, massacre, plunder and rapine. A race is formed with an object that it will keep itself distinctly aloof with all its peculiarities, from the other races of the world. But such an object cannot be strictly adhered to for long. Because, human promptings and leanings to what one finds most attractive wherever it may be, cannot be restrained. A European travelling in the East and finding a suitable mate has renounced his race and cast his lot wherever he has found a house and happiness. So also have done many Easterns who have gone to the West. Moreover a race however exclusive and pure has one day or other during its existence been attacked by another powerful race, and its much-vaunted purity has been destroyed in the course of less than a generation of autocratic and powerful rule.

Credits

Jacob ben Israel (Khan Bahadur), from Reflections on the Purity, or Otherwise, of the Bene-Israel Race in India (Bombay: Bahadur Printing Works, 1919), pp. 1–3.

Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 7.

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