Note 148 — INTRODUCTION (continued 2)

In reading through the foregoing account of the Jews in Arabia, it is quite clear that Benjamin never visited the country, nor did he pretend to have done so. In the words of Mr. C. E. Beazley (The Dawn of Modern Geography, p. 252), "It is no longer, for the most part, a record of personal travel; it is rather an attempt to supplement the first part 'of things seen' by a second 'of things heard.'" But Beazley is wrong when he characterizes as "wild" the account of the Jews of Southern Arabia "who were Rechabites." Does Benjamin say so? There is no such reading in the MS. of the British Museum. The student, it is thought, will by this time have come to the conclusion that it is the oldest and most trustworthy of our available authorities. The whole misconception has arisen from the fact that the unreliable MS. E and all the printed editions have transposed the letters of of it. Rapoport, in the article already referred to, seems to suspect the faulty reading: to justify it, he connects the men of Kheibar with the Rechabites and the sons of Heber the Kenite, basing his argument upon Jer. xxxv, Judges i. 16, I Sam. xxvii. 10, and I Chron. ii. 55.

Neither Zunz nor Asher makes any comments upon this chapter of the itinerary. Graetz gives an abstract of Benjamin's account; he, as well as all other writers, is unable to identify Tilmas, but is of opinion that Tanai must be Sanaa, the capital of Yemen, which, however, is twenty-five days' journey beyond Kheibar. It is well known that Yemen has, since Bible times, harboured a Jewish population, who—notwithstanding all oppression, intensified under Turkish rule—inhabit many of its towns and villages to the present day. It is comparatively accessible, owing to its proximity to the sea. We must cherish the hope that Great Britain, now that it claims the Hinterland of Aden, will extend its protection to the Jews.

The volcanic highlands (Harrah) of Kheibar were always inaccessible, owing to their being surrounded by waterless deserts and fanatic Bedouin tribes.

R. Abraham Farissol, who flourished at the beginning of the sixteenth century, writes that there was a large number of Jews in the district, who lived in tents and in wooden houses or huts. His contemporary, David Reubeni, who crossed from Arabia to Abyssinia and came to Europe in 1524, pretended to be brother of Joseph, king of the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and half-Manasseh in the desert of Chabor (Kheibar). Benjamin takes care to qualify his statement as to the origin of the Jews of Kheibar by adding "people say they belong to the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh, whom Salmanesser, King of Assyria, led hither into captivity."

I would here mention an interesting work of Dr. R. Dozy, Professor of History and Oriental Languages at Leyden, Die Israeliten in Mecca, 1864. By a series of ingenious inferences from Bible texts (1 Sam. xxx, 1 Chron. iv. 24-43, &c.) he essays to establish that the tribe of Simeon, after David had dispersed the Amalekites who had already been weakened by Saul, entered Arabia and settled all along in the land of the Minaeans and at Mecca, where they established the worship at the Kaaba and introduced practices which have not been altogether abandoned up to the present day. Dr. Dozy further contends that after Hezekiah's reign numerous Jewish exiles came to Arabia.

Hommel, in two articles in Ersch and Gruber's Encyclopaedia, under "Bedouins" and "Anzah," gives full particulars respecting the Anizeh, otherwise Anaessi, tribe—that they were in the habit of joining the Wahabees and other Bedouin tribes in attacking caravans and levying blackmail. The Turkish Pasha at Damascus had to pay annually passage-money to ensure the safety of the pilgrims to Mecca. On one occasion two of the Bedouin sheiks were decoyed by the Turks and killed; but the Anaessi, aided by other tribes to the number of 80,000, took ample revenge by pillaging the Mecca caravan on its return. They seized a quantity of pearls, and the women were said to have attempted boiling them with the rice. Seetzen (Journey through Syria, &c., I, ch. i, p. 356) says, "In Kheibar are no Jews now, only Anaessi." Layard and other modern writers often refer to the Anizeh Bedouins. Travellers go in dread of them in the Syrian desert and all along the Euphrates. Doughty mentions that they, more than any other tribe, resemble the Jews both in appearance and disposition.

Ritter (Geographie, vol. XII), in quoting Niebuhr, makes mention of the widespread Anizeh tribe of Bedouins who were anciently known to be Jews. He further states that the Jews of Damascus and Aleppo shun them as they are non-observant Jews, considered by some to be Karaites. Does all this give ground for any presumption that they are or were crypto-Jews, the descendants of the former Kheibar Jews, possibly also of those whom Omar allowed to settle at Kufa?

This lengthy note may be closed fitly with the following mysterious remark in Doughty's usual quaint style (vol. I, p. 127), in connexion with the murder of a Bagdad Jew who tried to reach Kheibar: "But let none any more jeopardy his life for Kheibar! I would that these leaves might save the blood of some: and God give me this reward of my labour! for who will, he may read in them all the tale of Kheibar."