Page:Essays ethnological and linguistic.djvu/178

166 The variety of theories which have been promulgated on the supposition of the loss of those ten tribes, and the numerous works which have been published on the subject, and continue to be published even up to the present time, show how great has been the interest felt regarding their fate, such as to warrant a fuller consideration of it than has been hitherto given; while in the diversity of opinions held respecting it, we cannot but perceive the advisability of passing by all those opinions as mere assumptions, and of endeavouring to ascertain at their original sources the elucidation of their true history.

Shortly after the commencement of our æra, it seems to have already become a prevalent opinion that the ten tribes of Israel, which had separated from their brethren under Jeroboam, and had subsequently been subjugated by the Assyrians, had all been swept away from their lands and taken by their conquerors into Assyria and Media, where their descendants were then still remaining. Josephus, who is considered to have written his work on the ancient history of the Jews about the year 93 of our æra, says, in his eleventh book, with reference to the return from captivity of those who came back with Ezra, "The entire body of the people of Israel remained in that country, wherefore there are but two tribes in Asia and Europe subject to the Romans, while the ten tribes are beyond the Euphrates till now, and are an immense multitude, not to be estimated by numbers." To the same effect St. Jerome in the fifth century, in his notes upon Hosea, says, "Unto this day the ten tribes are subject to the kings of the Parthians, nor has their captivity ever been loosed." And again he says, "The ten tribes inhabit at this day the cities and mountains of the Medes." It is the purpose of our argument to show that these writers were mistaken in their suppositions respecting these tribes, whatever might be the general value to be attached to their authority; but at present it will be sufficient to refer to them, as proving that in the early periods of our æra, they were considered to be still remaining in the land of their captivity. Later writers, however, and especially those of the Jewish race, not contented with this tradition, have been pleased to indulge in more fanciful dreams of those tribes having, at some anterior but undefined period, gone away from their captivity into some distant country, whence they declared they were to emerge at some future period, at the advent of their still-expected Messiah, and return with him triumphantly to the land of their fathers. This rabbinical fancy might have slumbered unnoticed, with so many