History and Legends
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Prior to their conversion to Christianity in the 19th Century, the Chin-Kuki-Mizo were headhunters and animists who migrated in waves from East Asia until they settled in northeastern India. They have no written history but their legends refer to a beloved homeland that they were driven away from called Sinlung/Chhinlung. Anthropologists and historians believe that it was located in China's Yunnan province and that the Tibeto-Burman migration from there began about 6000 years ago. National Geographic's Genographic Project plans to sample the gene pool of northeastern Indian tribes which may shed definitive light on their origins.
The Bnei Menashe believe that the traditional Mizo-Kuki-Hmar harvest festival song in the Hmar language, "Sikpui Hla (Sikpui Song)" which features events paralleled in the Book of Exodus, such as enemies chasing them over a red-coloured sea, quails, and a pillar of cloud is clear evidence of their Israelite ancestry. Translation of the lyrics:
| “ | While we are preparing for the Sikpui Feast,
The big red sea becomes divided; As we march along fighting our foes, We are being led by pillar of cloud by day,'' And pillar of fire by night. Our enemies, O ye folks, are thick with fury, Come out with your shields and arrows. Fighting our enemies all day long, We march forward as cloud-fire goes before us. The enemies we fought all day long, The big sea swallowed them like wild beast. Collect the quails, And draw the water that springs out of the rock. |
” |
On 1 April 2007, Michael Freund reported in the Jerusalem Post that the Bnei Menashe claim to have a chant they call Miriam's Prayer. The words of the chant are identical to that of the Sikpui Song and the Post article is the first known print reference to Miriam's Prayer aka Sikpui Hla.
Freund goes on to report that according to the Bnei Menashe "a century ago, when British missionaries first arrived in India's North-East, they were astonished to find that the local tribesmen worshipped one god, were familiar with many of the stories of the Bible, and were practicing a form of biblical Judaism".
By all empirical accounts, the entire tribe were animists at the time of the arrival of the missionaries.
Read more about this topic: Bnei Menashe
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