I guess what is interesting to me is the fact that in the early days of the church, it is evident that the early church leaders believed the 2nd coming was imminent. As such, the literal gathering of the lost 10 tribes would have been a necessary part of that. The Book of Mormon’s emphasis that Lehi was of the tribe of Joseph was much more important then, than it is today. It is interesting to me that there is a lack of interest in the gathering of the lost tribes, despite the persistent talk of the 2nd coming. Obviously, the 2nd coming is downplayed more today than the 1830′s. As such, the 10th article of faith gets little interest.

No, I’m suggesting that the seed of the Lamanites will inherit (hopefully the easy way) leadership of the Restoration church from the Gentiles upon the Lamanites’ conversion to Christ, and that conversion (not the physical relocation to the Mid-East) will be used by God to play an important role in the subsequent conversion of their brethren in Israel, since the “convincing of the Jew” is stated as one of the purposes of the Book of Mormon in the preface.

There is always a tendency for people to subconsciously think that they can bring a lot of people from different cultures into the church without the culture of the church itself changing. I fight that in myself. In fact, when Jewish Christians in the first century started converting gentiles, they were in for the shock of their lives, and even the Apostles argued about the issues the newcomers raised.

To your other point. since Lehi left after the scattering, I suspect the Lamanites have nothing to do necessarily with the physical gathering of the 10 tribes. I have no opinion about where the 10 went, or when and in what numbers they will return to Jerusalem and a Western Hemisphere literal gathering.

As a matter of fact, I don’t think many of those the Assyrians took got much choice about religious purity in marriage, so by now the seed of the 10 tribes could hardly avoid being scattered all over the planet.

Perhaps I am misunderstanding your comment. I understand that righteous gentiles are grafted into the house of Israel, and I think there is plenty of statements from past leaders affirming such a position. However, I do not believe that Joseph believed that these grafted gentiles were supposed to return to the land of Israel. Is that what you’re saying?

While I don’t expect many Mormons to be familiar with Simcha Jacobovici’s work, I find his theory that the lost 10 tribes are found in African, Chinese, Indian, Russian, and Middle Eastern nations quite interesting. If DNA evidence can corroborate Jacobovici’s work, then it would seem that DNA might be a way to identify these lost 10 tribes, thus fulfilling in a tangible way, the 10th article of faith. Many of these small groups already claim to have Israelite blood, and have petitioned the Israeli government for citizenship. Except for the tribe of Dan (during the Israeli Ethiopian airlift in the 1990′s), there have been no other groups granted citizenship claiming membership from another tribe. Even this group of Danites, was not confirmed by DNA, but rather by rabbinical judgment.

I don’t see gentiles grafted into the House of Israel as fulfilling the 10th article of faith. Am I misunderstanding something here?

I am something of a believer that prophets and leaders can be held back from seeing all that God would reveal by the sins of the people, so I wouldn’t put that burden primarily on the leadership. but otherwise, yes. One of the later D&C sections given to us after the split between our denominations says (if I can quote it correctly) “were it not for the transgressions of My people, Zion could have been redeemed even now.”

The righteous gentiles are grafted onto the house of Israel, not the other way around. (Maybe the surrendering of pride involved in turning over leadership power will be the final test of the church’s obedience. Who knows?)

Manasseh seems to be the default tribe for Japanese members. That’s what they’re usually told, although I don’t think the percentage is quite as overwhelming as Ephraim is for Americans.

I know some Jewish converts who are Levi and a couple who are not. I know one or two from most of the other tribes.

For anyone else, are you aware of any Jewish converts who are a literal descendant of Aaron, or of the Tribe of Levi? Anyone from Dan, Naphtali, Simeon, etc?

Firetag, I’m not sure I comprehend your questions. Are you saying that if the early leaders of the Restoration had been more zionic, then we would have Native Americans in the Quorum of 12 back then and today?

Part of the OT references the notion that even if a mother forgets her children, God will not forget Israel. When he pulled Lehi out of Jerusalem, it was for the welfare of all people, including those left behind, as well as for Lehi’s seed and the Gentiles that would come along a couple of thousand years later.

Think about the general options. Had the early Restoration been more Zionic, what would have happened as America developed the West? Might that Zionic impulse have not already lifted up leaders of the church from among the ones our archeological models suggest to be the Lamanite descendents? If that righteousness is still being developed among we “gentiles”, is the passage of that leadership back to the Lamanites still in our future? And, if the gentiles do not develop further in that righteousness, there are warnings that those same Lamanites will be empowered to move like lions among the gentiles and take that leadership.

Let’s not get so wrapped up in issues of personal salvation in the afterlife that we forget God has been putting in place ways to finish some other business on earth for thousands of years.

Thanks for the links (though the first one requires payment). I have been wanting to do a post on the Lemba Tribe in Africa which can trace ancestry back to Jewish origins. Frankly, I find DNA stuff interesting, but incredibly confusing. It seems there are many contradictory conclusions.

I also think it’s fascinating to contemplate that anchoring the promise to Abraham pretty much eliminates the fighting among the Abrahamic religions – and opening up the “gathering” to either a grand communal sealing through temple ordinances or a literal “blood transfusion” as all societies become known and intermingled biologically destroys all arrogance based on “believing blood”. It leaves the importance of the covenant and the House of Israel adoptive process in place, but it expands the actual boundaries such that they essentially disappear.

I notice you missed the post on Unconventional BoM Geography, but there is a radical theory stating that BoM lands could be in Burma, so, under that theory, the DNA would be a help, rather than hindrance to BoM geography. Of course, the theory introduces other problems, but seemingly DNA wouldn’t be one of the problems. For those that read the previous post, my comment makes more sense in that context, which is why I stated it that way. (I’m sure you won’t read all 300 comments, but you might want to be acquainted with it.)

About breaking the covenant: the children of Israel appear to have transgressed Torah many times over the course of the OT, and Jesus highlights their divergence from God’s laws (Torah _and_ the spirit of the law) in the NT, but the thing about Abraham’s covenant is that it isn’t conditional: Abraham is promised boundless posterity and blessings without stipulation. This form of covenant seems to imply that it will not be revoked, even by transgression of posterity. If we accept this, then somehow Abraham’s seed will continue to be the beneficiaries of the Lord’s promise regardless of what they do (including killing the Son of God).

I think that it is only in our day that the promises extended to Abraham’s seed became available to all people, regardless of parentage. But this availability is conditional upon personal righteousness. Higher stakes, for sure. But back to the “no respector of persons” thing, I think that phrase is meant to connote that every person will be judge for his or her own actions in context, and that God will not show favoritism towards one person because of station in life. Interpreted toward unrighteous children of Israel, I think this also means that although Abraham’s blessing provides special promises in general, individuals can still send themselves to Hell through unrighteous acts and attitudes.

On a separate point, however, I read some paper on genetics recently (link: here; c.f. here) that breaks genealogy into probabilities. The paper essentially said that it only took something like 30 generations for there to exist a link between every single living person on the planet today to anyone else. Even using the BoM’s conservative generational spans (2 per century! see supposed chronology in 4 Nephi), we would only need to go back 1500 years to find common ancestors for every man, woman, and child on the planet. Thus, everyone is related to Abraham (b. 1812 BCE ; d. 1637 BCE by Jewish dating according to Wikipedia), and therefore inheritors of his blessings. That’s science laying the smack down on covenantal bloodlines!

lol, but they probably have a gene pool large enough to maintain genetic health. One hopes.

Come to think of it, though, I remember reading that inbreeding and consequent genetic defects are a problem in some of the fundamentalist Mormon groups.

Wow…what a comment on the general authorities of today (see past post on nepotism).

Well, DNA seems to have worked REALLY well in terms of identifying Native Americans as “lost tribes of Israel” descendants! (cough)

Given the racial teachings of the time, together with Brigham Young’s tendency toward extreme preaching (can we say “Mormon Reformation?”), it wouldn’t have surprised me if he had said that “apostates” and excommunicants were adopted into the lineage of Cain, complete with a change in skin color.

we become inheritors of the blessings of Abraham only as we keep commandments and live up to covenants.

So then, since the 10 tribes were obviously not worthy to be inheritors of the blessing of Abraham and were scattered due to unrighteousness, why does God care to gather them? If God only covenants with righteous people, the 10 tribes broke that covenant 2600 years ago. Why do they need to be gathered again? To fulfill prophecy is a nice answer, but if they aren’t worthy, then fulfilling prophecy seems kind of arbitrary, doesn’t it?

From their point of view, it’s not an irrational extension of a known fact that exists in the animal: the strength and health and quality of animals is largely determined by their genetic heritage, or in simplest terms, their blood.

The quality of animals is indeed largely determined by genetic heritage, but what that really means is that “impure” bloodlines are often superior to “pure” ones. Quite often, “pure” bloodlines mean inbred and thus inferior bloodlines. One need only look at the genetic wrecks that so many American dog breeds have become to see proof of this.

That’s not to say, of course, that the now scientifically discredited idea of “pure” bloodlines as superior can’t have been influential in the development of Mormon ideas about the 12 Tribes.

MH: “Isn’t this a form of discrimination and/or racism?” I didn’t say I liked it, but as I’m sure you know and understand, the Bible wasn’t written by individuals with the same sense of morality and ethics as contemporary society. The OT clearly favors the children of Israel by repeatedly showing how they are inheritors of God’s favor and blessings (and chastisements, but always in the concept of course correction back to the path of YHWH and His ultimate triumph over oppressors). The NT does well to show how Jesus reaches out to expand God’s love and outreach to all humanity.

So we’re all good, right, because the NT proclaims the availability of Gospel blessings to all people everywhere? Almost. The emphasis on Abrahamic covenants, the revitalization of the concept of a “chosen people” identified with the children of Israel all reintroduce the favoritism of God onto the scene in the latter days, but with a slight twist. Whereas Abraham was given an immutable, everlasting blessing of posterity, Lehi’s similar blessing was conditional upon righteousness. That same condition has been applied in the current Church’s concept of favoritism by deity: we become inheritors of the blessings of Abraham only as we keep commandments and live up to covenants. This democratizes God’s favor by availing the blessings to all people, but limits it to those who do their part. God is therefore able to have a “chosen people” upon whom He will bestow all the blessings of inheritance, but this people isn’t based on literal blood as much as personal worthiness (not to get too crazy on symbolic parallels, but these worthy people could be seen as somehow replacing their own non-special blood, with that of Christ’s through partaking of the bread and wine(water)). Still, all the prophecies and promises of the chosen people from the OT can therefore be transferred to the “chosen people” today.