Tribal Roots point to Hebrew origins…or do they?

“Ireland, Scotland, England and Wales
I can hear the mothers’ voices calling
Children, children…come home children”
-Van Morrison’s “Celtic Ray,” June 1988

The issue surfaced again recently, this notion of Irish legends and Israelite origins. The conjecture that the Irish, like the other inhabitants of the British Isles are of Hebrew extraction has for many centuries been an open secret and by no means the exclusive possession of the British-Israelites, or Anglo-Israelites as they are called in the United States today.

As far back as Claudius’s reign, Pomponius Mela, the Roman geographer, in his De Situ Orbis, asserted that the Jews were the earliest colonists of Ireland. In the 2nd century, A. D., the Egyptian astronomer, astrologer and geographer Ptolemy wrote: “They were peopled by the descendants of the Hebrews, and were skilled in smelting operations, and excelled in working metals.” Ancient Irish poetry describes the inhabitants of Ireland as “of the race of Heber, the ancestor of the Hebrews.”

Married to a Welsh woman who has for many years embraced the Hebrew faith, I’ve witnessed the genetic legacy of one’s ancestral past create in her a magnetic tug for answers. Looking for those answers, we travelled to the land of the Celts.

Armed with limited information, my wife Rebecca and I traveled to Wales, the land of her maternal forefathers and to England, home of her paternal forefathers to trace her genealogy. We knew the name of the city in Wales, the birthplace of her great grandfather and great grandmother, but little else.

Our arrival in Llandudno, Conwy, North Wales was on a Friday, where we chose to attend the Llandudno Hebrew Congregation Synagogue for Rosh Hashanah and Shabbat services. This is the oldest Orthodox Synagogue in Wales, dating to the 16th century. We were greeted with surprise and curiosity by the congregants who certainly seemed unaccustomed to visitors, particularly those from “across the pond.”

Equipped with maps and the meager information we brought with us; we located the township of Corris and began exploring the valley of so many of Rebecca’s ancestors. The old cemetery was situated on the grounds of the Carmell Corris, Talyllin, Wesleyan Methodist church erected in 1810. The Welch inscriptions on the gravestones appeared startlingly close to Hebrew script recalling what our friend UN Correspondent David Horowitz had told us so often, that the Welch and Hebrew languages are strikingly similar.

Irish legends are compatible with an original tradition of Israelite origins. In the eighteenth century, the Reverend Eliezer Williams wrote several works on the Celts. Williams contended that the roots of most of the ancient British or real Welsh words may be regularly traced in the Hebrew language. Karel Jongeling’s “Comparing Welsh and Hebrew,” (2000, The Netherlands) quoted from hundreds of examples in which the grammatical structure and characteristics of Welsh parallel those of the Hebrew.

The Elizabethan historian Camden, in his Britannia, wrote: “Postellus, in his public lectures in Paris, derives the name Ireland from the Jews, so that Irin is quasi Jurin, i.e. the land of the Jews. The Welsh call the Irish Iddew and the country Iddewon, or Jews land.

The process of researching information that we acquired during the trip has revealed astonishing points of history. Seventh Day Adventist Leslie Hardinge’s wonderful book “The Celtic Church in Britain” (Teach Services, Inc., Brushton, NY, 1973), revealed insightful historical background.

In her book, Hardinge states: “Before the coming of Augustine to England in A. D. 597, the Christian church in the British Isles was profoundly Celtic, rather than Roman. The beliefs and practices of the Celtic Christian Church were much closer to the first century church than the Church of Rome. Foremost in the Celtic belief was an insistence on a literal interpretation of the Bible, with the tendency to reject the writings of the Church Fathers, and a disdain for the authority of Church Councils. The Celtic theologian was keenly interested in the whole of the Scriptures, but his preoccupation with the Decalogue was even deeper. Many Celtic believers were Arians (anti-trinitarian). They kept the Sabbath, believing that the day begins at sundown. They were known to be Quartodeciman, observers of the Christian Passover on the fourteenth day of the first month in spring. They also eschewed unclean meats.”

The legendary Saint Patrick (AD 387-463) was born in Britain and evangelized Ireland. He was said to have founded over 300 churches and baptized more than 120,000 converts, earning him the title of patron saint of Ireland. Christianity however, existed in Ireland long before his time.

Wherever Patrick went and established a church, he left an old Celtic law book, Liber ex Lege Moisi (Book of the Law of Moses), along with the books of the Gospel. The Liber begins with the Decalogue and continues with selections from Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, totaling 35 in all.

It is most significant that the Liber should commence with the Decalogue, which certainly points to the interest of the Celtic Christian in keeping the Ten Commandments. The section also includes prohibitions against the forming of idols of silver or gold, and directions for making an altar of earth without steps, underlining the early stress in the Celtic Church of “altars of stone.” While Saint Patrick is revered as a Roman Catholic Saint, his writings appear to place him squarely in the Sabbath-keeping Messianic tradition.

The Celtic British Isles had a long history of Sabbath-keeping. Professor James C. Moffat, D.D. in his 1882 book “The Church in Scotland,” also stated “It seems to have been customary in Celtic Churches of early times, in Ireland as well as Scotland, to keep Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, as a day of rest from labor.” They obeyed the fourth commandment literally upon the seventh day of the week.

To its detriment, the Celtic Church was not united. Each group seemed to have been dependent upon the founder and its’ tribe, but independent of all others. No church leader among the Celts was held to be the spokesman of all. There was little unity of purpose thus they were unable to present a unified front and were absorbed into Roman Christianity piece by piece, finally disappearing.

Long before the Anglo-Israel theory was ever promulgated it was known that the Isles referred to were the British Isles. As far back as the year 1220, the learned Rabbi David Kimchi wrote: “The Islands of the sea of Isaiah II, belonged to the Roman Empire.”

Perhaps hearing the distant cries of Mother Rachael weeping for her children through the haunting words of Van Morrison’s lyrics, Rebecca’s personal search and spiritual journey continues. But now with a renewed sense of pride in her Welch-Celtic-and perhaps Hebrew influenced heritage.