Question
Before posing the question I would like to apologize for my ignorance of what may be a very well known fact of history.
As I understand all Prophets (Peace be on them all), before Prophet Mohammad (SAW), were sent to specific tribes. Hazrat Essa is even quoted to have refused to cure a non-Israeli lady and claimed that bread for boys should not be thrown to dogs. Under these circumstances, if people outside the tribe got influenced by the Message and wanted to offer Shahda what would they do? Were there such people, say at the time of Hazrat Moosa (AS)? If so who were they, Where are they? They couldn’t be called “Bani Israel”, what were they called? Do they have descendants to date? What are they known as?
Answer
The Encyclopedia Judaica writes:
There is ample evidence of a widespread conversion to Judaism during the period of the Second Temple, especially the latter part of the period, and the word ger, which in biblical times meant a stranger, or an alien, became synonymous with a proselyte. (Note on “Proselytes”)
There is also some evidence that there indeed were some non-Israelite Jews at the time of Moses (pbuh). The Bible says:
The same law shall apply to the native as to the stranger who sojourns among you. (Exodus 12: 49)
The Encyclopedia Judaica writes:
A proselyte must observe all the precepts that bind Jews. The statement: “There shall be one law for the citizen and for the stranger that dwelleth amongst you” (Ex. 12:49), which refers to the paschal lamb, the sages interpreted to mean that the stranger (proselyte) was the equal of the citizen concerning all the precepts of the Torah. (Mekh. Pisha, 15) (Note on “Proselytes”)
As to your question regarding whom these converts were and where they now are, this question is extremely difficult to answer for all convert Jews.
As is clear from the citations, these people were known as “strangers.”1 However, their present descendants may not be as clearly known.
It may, however, be worth mentioning that the Bible has also given some commandments including some of these “strangers” into the Israelites’ community. For instance, regarding the Edomites2 and the Egyptians, the Bible says:
The sons of the third generation who are born to them may enter the assembly of the LORD. (Deuteronomy 23: 8)
The Family Bible Notes writes:
Shall enter into the congregation; become entitled to all the privileges of an Israelite, if they embrace his religion.
According to John-Wesley’s Notes on the Old and New Testaments:
In their third generation – Supposing their grandfather, or great-grandfather turned proselyte, and the children continue in that faith received by such ancestors.
However, in contrast to the Edomites and the Egyptians, the Ammonites3 and Moabites4 were not to be admitted “even in the tenth generation”. The Bible says:
No Ammonite or Moabite shall enter the assembly of the LORD; none of their descendants, even to the tenth generation, shall ever enter the assembly of the LORD. (Deuteronomy 23: 4)
I hope this helps.
Regards,
Moiz Amjad
May 9, 2003
- Also “Aliens”. [↩]
- People of the land in the south of eastern Transjordan, the southeastern neighbor of Palestine [↩]
- The Ammonites are one of the many tribes, which emerged from the Syrio-Arabian desert during the second millennium B.C.E. and established a national kingdom in Transjordan. [↩]
- People of a land East of Jordan and the Dead Sea, one of Israel’s neighbors in biblical times [↩]