Nimat Allah al-Harawi
Encyclopedia
Ni'mat Allah al-Harawi is the author of a Persian language
epic history of the Afghans
while serving as a chronicler at the court of the Mughal Emperor Jehangir. Often referred to as Makhzan-i-Afghani and The History of the Afghans, its full name is properly Tarikh-i-Khan Jahani Makhzan-i-Afghani, signifying that its patron was Khan Jahan Lodi
, an Afghan general. There is a scholarly debate here, about whether the Tarikh is actually a different work, rather than a different recension of the same material.
The author was a librarian, then a waqia-navis (a chronicler at court. His work is dated c. 1612.
The material is part fictional, part historical. The book is a major source of tradition relating to the origins of the Pashtun
. It also covers Afghan rulers in Bengal
, contemporary events, and Afghan hagiography
. It plays a large part in various theories which have been offered about the possibility that the Pashtun people might be descended from the Israelites
, through the Ten Lost Tribes
.
The Makhzan traces the Pashtuns' origins from the Patriarch Abraham
down to a king named King Talut (Saul). Makhzan to this point agrees with testimony provided by Muslim sources or Hebrew Scriptures, showing King Saul around B.C. 1092 in Palestine.It is beyond this point that the description comes under serious doubt.
Makhzan-i-Afghani maintains that Saul
had a son Irmia (Jeremia) who again had a son called Afghana raised by King David upon the death of King Saul and later promoted to the chief command of the Army during the reign of King Solomon.
The description jumps to 6th century B.C. when Bakhtunnasar (Nebuchadnezzar
, king of Babylon) attacked Judah and exiled Bani-Israel, the progeny of Afghana, to Ghor in Afghanistan. This is contradictory, as Nebuchadnezzar attacked the Kingdom of Judah and Benjamin, not the kingdom of Israel of the Ten Tribes. The main ambiguity here is whether Makhzan-i-Afghani is failing to differentiate between the Kingdom of Judah
and the Kingdom of Israel. This may have crept in because Makhzan might have copied the tale of Jewish captivity from Muslim sources and Muslim sources weren't well acquainted with Jewish history. Nebuchadnezzar brought Jews in captivity to Babylonia around B.C. 580 until Cyrus
, the King of Persia, attacked Babylonia, freed the Jews, and allowed them to return to Jerusalem. So, Cyrus didn't send the Jews captives to Ghor but rather to Jerusalem.
However, Babylon did also conquer Assyria
, where the Ten Tribes had been exiled to decades before. After that, Babylon was conquered by Cyrus of Persia. So if Babylon achieved jurisdiction over them that way, that would credibly explain how they were exiled originally by Assyrians, yet the Pashtuns' story depicts them being ruled by Babylonians, and then by Cyrus of Persia.
The Assyrian king Shalmaneser
is the one who raided the Kingdom of Israel in B.C. 721 and sent the ten tribes in exile to Media, the North-Western part of today's Iran. The Persian Empire didn't exist at the time of first Jewish captivity(B.C. 721) and was founded later by Cyrus in B.C. 550. The ten exiled tribes might have mingled with the local population of Media or dispersed over to Russia and Eastern Europe. So the Jewish captives from the Kingdom of Judah
were eventually sent to Jerusalem. These contradictions cast some doubts on the Makhzan account of Jewish captivity and so undermines its authenticity.
Israelites from the Kingdom of Israel might have been sent separately to a different area. The Bnei Menashe
of India also have traditions which trace their wanderings as going originally from the Persian Empire to Afghanistan. In their case, they then went to China, where they encountered persecution, then pressed on to India and Southern Asia.
was the ancestor of most of the existing Pashtun
tribes. He met Muhammad
and embraced Islam
, receiving the Muslim name of Abdur Rashid. He had three sons, Ghourghusht, Sarban
and Bitan
(Baitan). Karlan
, the fourth legendary ancestor, is wrongly attributed as Qais's fourth son. In fact he was his grandson of Ghourghusht and the son of burhan
, 1960-62.
Pashtun people
Assyrian Captivity of Israel
History of ancient Israel and Judah
Persian language
Persian is an Iranian language within the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. It is primarily spoken in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and countries which historically came under Persian influence...
epic history of the Afghans
Pashtun people
Pashtuns or Pathans , also known as ethnic Afghans , are an Eastern Iranic ethnic group with populations primarily between the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan and the Indus River in Pakistan...
while serving as a chronicler at the court of the Mughal Emperor Jehangir. Often referred to as Makhzan-i-Afghani and The History of the Afghans, its full name is properly Tarikh-i-Khan Jahani Makhzan-i-Afghani, signifying that its patron was Khan Jahan Lodi
Lodhi dynasty
Lodi Dynasty was a Pashtun dynasty that was the last dynasty to rule the Delhi Sultanate. The dynasty founded by Bahlul Lodi ruled from 1451 to 1526...
, an Afghan general. There is a scholarly debate here, about whether the Tarikh is actually a different work, rather than a different recension of the same material.
The author was a librarian, then a waqia-navis (a chronicler at court. His work is dated c. 1612.
The material is part fictional, part historical. The book is a major source of tradition relating to the origins of the Pashtun
Pashtun people
Pashtuns or Pathans , also known as ethnic Afghans , are an Eastern Iranic ethnic group with populations primarily between the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan and the Indus River in Pakistan...
. It also covers Afghan rulers in Bengal
Bengal
Bengal is a historical and geographical region in the northeast region of the Indian Subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. Today, it is mainly divided between the sovereign land of People's Republic of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal, although some regions of the previous...
, contemporary events, and Afghan hagiography
Hagiography
Hagiography is the study of saints.From the Greek and , it refers literally to writings on the subject of such holy people, and specifically to the biographies of saints and ecclesiastical leaders. The term hagiology, the study of hagiography, is also current in English, though less common...
. It plays a large part in various theories which have been offered about the possibility that the Pashtun people might be descended from the Israelites
Theory of Pashtun descent from Israelites
The theory that the Pashtun people originate from the exiled Lost Tribes of Israel was first debated by Western historians after the 19th century...
, through the Ten Lost Tribes
Ten Lost Tribes
The Ten Lost Tribes of Israel refers to those tribes of ancient Israel that formed the Kingdom of Israel and which disappeared from Biblical and all other historical accounts after the kingdom was destroyed in about 720 BC by ancient Assyria...
.
Origin theories
The Bani-Israelite theory about the origin of the Pashtuns is based on Pashtun oral traditions; the tradition itself was documented in the Makhzan-i-Afghani, which is the only written source addressing Pashtun origins.The Makhzan traces the Pashtuns' origins from the Patriarch Abraham
Abraham
Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...
down to a king named King Talut (Saul). Makhzan to this point agrees with testimony provided by Muslim sources or Hebrew Scriptures, showing King Saul around B.C. 1092 in Palestine.It is beyond this point that the description comes under serious doubt.
Makhzan-i-Afghani maintains that Saul
Saul
-People:Saul is a given/first name in English, the Anglicized form of the Hebrew name Shaul from the Hebrew Bible:* Saul , including people with this given namein the Bible:* Saul , a king of Edom...
had a son Irmia (Jeremia) who again had a son called Afghana raised by King David upon the death of King Saul and later promoted to the chief command of the Army during the reign of King Solomon.
The description jumps to 6th century B.C. when Bakhtunnasar (Nebuchadnezzar
Nebuchadnezzar
Nebuchadnezzar was the name of several kings of Babylonia.* Nebuchadnezzar I, who ruled the Babylonian Empire in the 12th century BC* Nebuchadnezzar II , the Babylonian ruler mentioned in the biblical Book of Daniel...
, king of Babylon) attacked Judah and exiled Bani-Israel, the progeny of Afghana, to Ghor in Afghanistan. This is contradictory, as Nebuchadnezzar attacked the Kingdom of Judah and Benjamin, not the kingdom of Israel of the Ten Tribes. The main ambiguity here is whether Makhzan-i-Afghani is failing to differentiate between the Kingdom of Judah
Kingdom of Judah
The Kingdom of Judah was a Jewish state established in the Southern Levant during the Iron Age. It is often referred to as the "Southern Kingdom" to distinguish it from the northern Kingdom of Israel....
and the Kingdom of Israel. This may have crept in because Makhzan might have copied the tale of Jewish captivity from Muslim sources and Muslim sources weren't well acquainted with Jewish history. Nebuchadnezzar brought Jews in captivity to Babylonia around B.C. 580 until Cyrus
Cyrus the Great
Cyrus II of Persia , commonly known as Cyrus the Great, also known as Cyrus the Elder, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Under his rule, the empire embraced all the previous civilized states of the ancient Near East, expanded vastly and eventually conquered most of Southwest Asia and much...
, the King of Persia, attacked Babylonia, freed the Jews, and allowed them to return to Jerusalem. So, Cyrus didn't send the Jews captives to Ghor but rather to Jerusalem.
However, Babylon did also conquer Assyria
Assyria
Assyria was a Semitic Akkadian kingdom, extant as a nation state from the mid–23rd century BC to 608 BC centred on the Upper Tigris river, in northern Mesopotamia , that came to rule regional empires a number of times through history. It was named for its original capital, the ancient city of Assur...
, where the Ten Tribes had been exiled to decades before. After that, Babylon was conquered by Cyrus of Persia. So if Babylon achieved jurisdiction over them that way, that would credibly explain how they were exiled originally by Assyrians, yet the Pashtuns' story depicts them being ruled by Babylonians, and then by Cyrus of Persia.
The Assyrian king Shalmaneser
Shalmaneser
Shalmaneser is the name of several Assyrian kings:*Shalmaneser I *Shalmaneser II, King of Assyria from 1031 BC to 1019 BC*Shalmaneser III, king of Assyria *Shalmaneser IV, king of Assyria...
is the one who raided the Kingdom of Israel in B.C. 721 and sent the ten tribes in exile to Media, the North-Western part of today's Iran. The Persian Empire didn't exist at the time of first Jewish captivity(B.C. 721) and was founded later by Cyrus in B.C. 550. The ten exiled tribes might have mingled with the local population of Media or dispersed over to Russia and Eastern Europe. So the Jewish captives from the Kingdom of Judah
Kingdom of Judah
The Kingdom of Judah was a Jewish state established in the Southern Levant during the Iron Age. It is often referred to as the "Southern Kingdom" to distinguish it from the northern Kingdom of Israel....
were eventually sent to Jerusalem. These contradictions cast some doubts on the Makhzan account of Jewish captivity and so undermines its authenticity.
Israelites from the Kingdom of Israel might have been sent separately to a different area. The Bnei Menashe
Bnei Menashe
The Bnei Menashe are a group of more than 9,000 people from India's North-Eastern border states of Manipur and Mizoram who claim descent from one of the Lost Tribes of Israel. The claim appeared after a Pentecostalist dreamt in 1951 that his people's pre-Christian religion was Judaism and that...
of India also have traditions which trace their wanderings as going originally from the Persian Empire to Afghanistan. In their case, they then went to China, where they encountered persecution, then pressed on to India and Southern Asia.
The Pashtun ancestry
According to Nimat Allah, QaisQais Abdur Rashid
Qais Abdur Rashid Khan , also known as Kesh, Kish, Qesh and Imraul Qais is a legendary ancestor of the Pashtun race, claimed to be the first ethnic Pashtun who travelled to Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia during the early days of Islam.) He is believed to be the 37th descendent of King Saul .He...
was the ancestor of most of the existing Pashtun
Pashtun people
Pashtuns or Pathans , also known as ethnic Afghans , are an Eastern Iranic ethnic group with populations primarily between the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan and the Indus River in Pakistan...
tribes. He met Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
and embraced Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
, receiving the Muslim name of Abdur Rashid. He had three sons, Ghourghusht, Sarban
Sarban
Abdul-Rahim Sārbān , known simply as Sarban, was a singer from Kabul, Afghanistan. He was born in Kabul an old area called to rice verdure father and stay home mother. He is known for his unique voice and music style that no other singer from Afghanistan has been able to imitate...
and Bitan
Bitan
Bitan , historically called "Shi-Bitan", is a tourist spot in Xindian District, New Taipei City, Republic of China . Bitan literally means Green Lake, referring to where the Xindian River widens to form the lake. There is a well-known suspension bridge that is used only for people on foot. The...
(Baitan). Karlan
Karlan
Karlan or Kalanai is said to have been a direct descendant of Ghurghusht the second son of the legendary Qais Abdur Rashid, the folklorish ancestor of the Pashtun people. He was the son of Burhan himself the son of Ghurghusht. Because of the numerous tribes associated with his name, he is sometimes...
, the fourth legendary ancestor, is wrongly attributed as Qais's fourth son. In fact he was his grandson of Ghourghusht and the son of burhan
English translations
A translation appeared in 1829 by Bernhard Dorn; this was not complete. It is still being reprinted. There is another partial translation from 1958, Roy Nirodbhusan, Niamatullah's History of the Afghans. A translation in two volumes by S. M. Imamuddin appeared in DhakaDhaka
Dhaka is the capital of Bangladesh and the principal city of Dhaka Division. Dhaka is a megacity and one of the major cities of South Asia. Located on the banks of the Buriganga River, Dhaka, along with its metropolitan area, had a population of over 15 million in 2010, making it the largest city...
, 1960-62.
See also
AfghanistanAfghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...
Pashtun people
Pashtun people
Pashtuns or Pathans , also known as ethnic Afghans , are an Eastern Iranic ethnic group with populations primarily between the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan and the Indus River in Pakistan...
Assyrian Captivity of Israel
Assyrian captivity of Israel
The Northern Kingdom of Israel was conquered by the Neo-Assyrian monarchs, Tiglath-Pileser III and Shalmaneser V. The later Assyrian rulers Sargon II and his son and successor, Sennacherib, were responsible for finishing the twenty year demise of Israel's northern ten tribe kingdom. Sennacherib...
History of ancient Israel and Judah
History of ancient Israel and Judah
Israel and Judah were related Iron Age kingdoms of ancient Palestine. The earliest known reference to the name Israel in archaeological records is in the Merneptah stele, an Egyptian record of c. 1209 BCE. By the 9th century BCE the Kingdom of Israel had emerged as an important local power before...