[Avodah] Ten Tribes (was Yovel)

[Micha Berger]

On Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 02:06:31AM +0100, Allan Engel wrote:
: Why is it such a stretch to say that, in the same way that he will reveal
: the shevet of every member of klal yisroel, he will also reveal the shevet
: of those people who don't even know themselves to be Jewish? How would they
: be in any worse position than a Jewish Tinok Shenishba?

It's a stretch, because that's not what the gemara I pointed to says.
Again, see Yevamos 17a. The gemara asks what about the descendents
of the daughters of the 10 shevatim?

Answer 1: There is a mesorah that they went sterile. (I assume this means
that anyone who thinks they are from one of these shevatim must therefore
be patrilineal.)

Answer 2, given by R' Yehudah besheim Shemu'el: Chakhamim at the time
declared them non-Jews. And this is proven by a pasuq in Hosheia.

And then we were discussing whether this is a general rule -- that
matrilineal descent can be anulled by ignorance (R' Aharon Lichtenstein's
shitah) or it was a gezeira (simple peshat in the gemara and in the Bach
RAL cites). See "Leaves of Faith", pg 63
<http://books.google.com/books?id=_QshqTu9nGIC&lpg=PA57&pg=PA63#v=onepage>

But in any case, chazal know as from a pasuq that they are non-Jews. There
is no hidden identity here to be revealed.

At least it seems open-and-shut to me.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             It is our choices...that show what we truly are,
micha at aishdas.org        far more than our abilities.
http://www.aishdas.org                           - J. K. Rowling
Fax: (270) 514-1507