Ashkenazic Jews’ mysterious origins unravelled by scientists thanks to ancient DNA

Discussion about the Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, pseudepigrapha, Philo, Josephus, Talmud, Dead Sea Scrolls, archaeology, etc.
semiopen
Posts: 471
Joined: Sat Mar 08, 2014 6:27 pm

Re: Ashkenazic Jews’ mysterious origins unravelled by scientists thanks to ancient DNA

Post by semiopen »

Warren releases results of DNA test - https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics ... spartanntp

This news item is interesting in the Ashkenazi context because of the generational estimates.
The analysis of Warren’s DNA was done by Carlos D. Bustamante, a Stanford University professor and expert in the field who won a 2010 MacArthur fellowship, also known as a genius grant, for his work on tracking population migration via DNA analysis.

He concluded that “the vast majority” of Warren’s ancestry is European, but he added that “the results strongly support the existence of an unadmixed Native American ancestor.”

Bustamante calculated that Warren’s pure Native American ancestor appears in her family tree “in the range of 6-10 generations ago.” That timing fits Warren’s family lore, passed down during her Oklahoma upbringing, that her great-great-great-grandmother, O.C. Sarah Smith, was at least partially Native American.
The article goes on -
The inherent imprecision of the six-page DNA analysis could provide fodder for Warren’s critics. If her great-great-great-grandmother was Native American, that puts her at 1/32nd American Indian. But the report includes the possibility that she’s just 1/512th Native American if the ancestor is 10 generations back.
In this case, however, there is the evidence of the family legend which is a strong argument for believing the more recent possibility; not to mention the inherent stupidity of making a 1/512 argument.

In the Ashkenazi situation, the times are much more distant, even the most recent estimate, makes 1/512 look like an extremely large number.
Secret Alias
Posts: 18362
Joined: Sun Apr 19, 2015 8:47 am

Re: Ashkenazic Jews’ mysterious origins unravelled by scientists thanks to ancient DNA

Post by Secret Alias »

Exactly. This is all such crap. Let's not forget that Hitler and the Nazis shaped the modern Jewish identity more so than Moses and the Patriarchs. This whole notion of 'race' which is a completely foreign concept to Judaism of the first four centuries of the Common Era has its roots in the policies which sought to exterminate Jewry. Even the term 'anti-Semitic' is empty of any real meaning (it certainly isn't applied nowadays to Syrians = al-Sham let alone other Semitic people. I know this first hand. My grandfather had my mother before the war and married an Italian beauty after the war owing to fears about his children being 'again' put in concentration camps because of their race. If you go back to the Imperial legal codes it was the Roman state which prevented Jewish proselytizing not Judaism per se. Even now Samaritans have started converting large communities in Brazil. More 'Samaritan converts' exist in the world nowadays as compared to pure blooded Samaritans (even though these 'pure bloods' are often secretly of mixed (Jewish) origin. Let's not forget that the situation with Bar Kochba revolt was one were proselytes already outnumbered 'pure bloods.' With recent archaeological discoveries we see the mass slaughter of Jews by Jews throughout the period four centuries on each side of the 'Common Era' accounts - along with the first disastrous revolt against Rome - of basically purging a large number of the 'pure bloods' - if these people ever existed.
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Post Reply