Are the ancient Israelites/ Modern Jews descended from the Egyptians ?

Question

The reason I ask this is the first record we have is from Moses, a Prince of Egypt ( although he was adopted). Could the Exodus represent a group splitting event between ancient peoples in Egypt or is their evidence ( DNA/ Y chromosome lineage/Mitochondrial DNA) of an origin in mesopotamia ( Abraham ). Has anyone applied genetic ancestral tracing to see the relationship between the ancient peoples of middle east ( Or is it too contraversial) ?

Answer 1

I believe that the origin is Chaldean and the locallity was a city of Ur located somewhere in lower south central Turkey or norther Syria by todays topography.  There was no specific ethic or racial element with the appelation of 'Jew' until Abraham.  As you know he [Abrahm] left his people as a result of his beliefs and travelled south with his servents, kindred, and half sister Sarah whom he married.  They were indiginous peoples in a region.

The appelation of Jew came later with the intervention of the Divine in Abrahans journey.  His decendant, Joseph,, one of whom became a Visier in Egypt,  brought his family and probably many others of the same genetic lines into Egypt during a protracted mid east famine.  The fact that famine caused by draught struct Egypt with the Nile River supplying its water combined with Egypt's reputation for fertility suggest something of a global climatic catastrophe.  The nile has its source in, I believe, Keyna.  At any rate thses 'visitors' to Egypt undoubtably took the lower labor jobs and later became endentured to the Egyptian social structure.  One method of debt repayment was slavery in the ancient world.  Respective genetic purity;  there can be little or no doubt that inter-racial relations took place but probably not within the Royal household..  

Roman historians claimed that the Exodus was not the result of Gods Will but as a result of a forced mass deportation.  The Jews were considered unclean and thought to have an affinity for leprocy.  Therefore, according to ancient authorship, they were expelled.  Frankly I believe in the Biblical reasons but it is possible that the Jews in Egypt became too much to handle and were expelled.  For whatever reason the Roman authorities agree that they were pursued by Pharoh  and that Pharoh's army was blighted by what the ancients referred to as a "tempest".  Interestingly enough, it is stated that  the Jews were forced to leave BUT that they were allowed to take incredible "booty" with them.  This may explain why they were pursued by the Egyptian military who may have had a change of heart seeing their wealth disappear. It does add a dimension & credence to the Biblical narritive.

I do not subscribe to the possibility that the Exodus was the result of phenotypic paradyme shift.  I think between the Bible and the Romans they have enough information to form a cogent hypothesis.  I do not have the studies at hand but it is my opinion  that mitochondrial RNA matching throughtout the peoples of the Mid East would yeild strong positives across states and groups.

Answer 2

If we are to believe that that Hebrew-speaking peoples (Proto-Jews), were in captivity in Egypt for 400 years (Circa 1900-1500 BCE), then yes, some Israelites likely were descendants of Egyptians...

Have your DNA Haplogroup tested, and see if you can find out something definitive!

Answer 3

It is not too controversial.  There has been alot of discusson and genetics testing in this regard. Various studies.  Nothing has been traced back to Abraham though.

http://www.khazaria.com/genetics/abstrac...

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?a...

https://www3.nationalgeographic.com/geno...