Archaeology and Jewish Law: The Birth of Racism

Around 60,000 years ago, two forms of humans met in what is now Northern Israel. They lived together, ate together and probably slept together and even had children (at least some) together. They are referred to as Neanderthal and Homo sapien. This lasted about 30,000 years when the Neanderthals seem to vanish (extinction or assimilation?) and homo sapien went on to populate the rest of the world.

The Neanderthals came from the North and the homo sapiens came up from the South. There is no reason to suppose that ALL of the neanderthals left their Northern origins in what is now Western and Eastern Europe nor is there any reason to believe that ALL of the homo sapiens left their Southern origins.

And in fact, despite the over-simplified version now professed by archeological experts, there is no reason to believe that NONE of the Neanderthals went North with Homo Sapiens or that NONE of the Neanderthals went South. And we do not know if the progeny of the interbreeding of these two closely related humanoids ever survived or took the place of what had been Neanderthal or what would become homo sapien and if they did survive whether they too might have gone North South, East and/or West.

It is possible that Neanderthals were modified by their interaction with homo sapien and vica versa. It is also possible that those Neanderthals that did not migrate were not modified and that those homo sapiens who did not migrate were also not modified — at least until the return of their ancestors, and whatever visitors they brought with them. 

Thus we have several groups: Neanderthals may or may not have evolved on their own and either died out through extinction or still live among us closely resembling what we call homo sapien. The differences may be subtle enough that the two might be confused. If so, this “race” was probably light skinned because they evolved in the Northern colder climates. Homo sapiens may or may not have evolved on their own as well, producing a “race” that was not intermixed with external breeding. If so, it is likely that this “race” was dark skinned because they evolved from the Southern hotter climates.

Interbreeding might have produced uneven results with deformities and other “flaws” or “defects” appearing regularly, hence the continual references in the Torah to avoiding such people — the Nephalim. These were people to the naked eye but whose nature was closer to the animal kingdom than to the humans with a “soul.” They were clearly regarded as subhuman but apparently “used” for a variety of menial and “dirty” or “unclean” tasks, perhaps including handling of the dead. 

There is also no guarantee that the migrations of any one of the three “races” described above did not involve East-West migration. Hence, Asia might be the result of migration from the West or Western evolution might have been affected by migration FROM the East where yet another form of humanoid was evolving independently. In any event this obviously resulted in yet another “race.”

Back when things were just evolving into these groups it was of course part of the hard wired nature of every living thing with a brain that processes information to regard anything other than themselves as either food or threat. The “us” and “them” basic primeval instinct caused customs and traditions to evolve separately and to regard others as not quite “equal” or perhaps, as we have seen above “subhuman” or not human at all even if they looked mostly human. 

The interesting irony about all this is that in all likelihood, experts agree, we are more descended from homo sapien than Neanderthal or any hybrid of Neanderthal, homo sapien or any evolutionary amendments thereto. And THAT means our origins are mostly dark skinned rather than light skinned — even if later migration caused the skin to lighten to suit Northern climates. Hence the black-white racial divide in America might well be “the pot calling the kettle black” and any traditions based upon “differences” might well be institutionalization of misperception.

Tags: afro-american, causasian, homo sapien, hybrid, neanderthal, Nephalim, racism, unclean