AFRICAN SLAVERY AND THE LAND OF ISRAEL

According to the community of African Hebrew Israelites, when the Romans conquered Jerusalem in 70 CE, destroyed the Temple, and exiled hundreds of thousands of Judeans from their homeland, many migrated to Africa, some settling in west Africa, from where they were taken as slaves to the Americas. This bit of history could be open to debate, but it is definitely known that, beginning in 1619, when the first African slaves arrived in, what is now, the United States, they eventually adopted the form of Christianity of their white masters. This involved the learning of the Bible which taught to revere the Land of Israel and its native people, the Jews. During the two and a half centuries of the slavery period, glorifying Israel, the Biblical stories, and the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, abounded among the “Negro spirituals”. The story of the Jewish slaves in ancient Egypt, especially, was used as a metaphor for the Africans’ own suffering. Ironically, many Jews, descendants of those slaves in Egypt, did not see the similarity between their ancestors’ experiences and the latter-day African experiences in America. While not as active in the slave trade as their Christian neighbors – Aaron Lopez being one major exception – Jewish attitudes toward slavery mirrored American society as a whole. In pro-slavery areas of the country, Jews also tended to be pro-slavery and held slaves. In anti-slavery areas, Jews were also anti-slavery. Officially, the Jewish leadership in the US, namely Rabbi Wise, and halukkah organizers Rabbis Leeser and Morris Raphall, were either shamefully quiet about the subject, or, as in the case of Rabbi Raphall, sympathetic to slavery. In Philadelphia, Jews were among the most active abolitionists. However, Philadelphia-born Mordechai Manuel Noah was slavery’s most vocal advocate. On the opposite side, Judah Touro was one of its most outspoken opponents as was Rabbi Felsenthal. Rabbi Einhorn, the “practical colonization” advocate, was almost lynched by a mob due to his outspoken anti-slavery stand.