Most Complete Jewish Tree?

I think we are all better served by recruiting a professor from Bar Ilan who is knowledgable in pre-Hasmonean biblical genealogies.

This will pre-empt chismatic arguments.

Hello everyone, what do you think about this link:

http://www.geni.com/path/S+Ivansson+is+related+to+King+David+%D7%93...

is it trustworthy?

nope. the link through charlemagne is highly questionable

There are three very common paths for a plausible Davidic descent for modern people without other Jewish ancestry. I would rank them in the following order of decreasing likelihood:

1. Through Paloma ha-Leví Benveniste, wife of Fadrique Alfonso. This line is contentious, because the evidence for her father is weak. However it is the line most likely to be correct.

2. Through Charlemagne. This line contains a series of modern academic speculations, which might or might not be correct. The generations that connect Salome Alexandra, Queen of Judaea to later Roman families are particularly suspect. (I can't speak to her ancestry.)

3. Through Pagano Ebriaci, di Pisa. It is very uncertain that he was a son of Yosef of Fustat. Far fewer people have this descent than any of the others.

Then there are three paths that are certainly or almost certainly false:

1. Through Dôn verch Mathonwy, {Fictitious, Mabinogion}, who is said in a medieval Welsh manuscript to have been a "near kinswoman" of the Virgin Mary. Legend filled in the blank, making her a sister or daughter of Joseph of Arimathea. Most scholars believe this line is a medieval forgery.

2. Through Thierry I, count of Autun. A modern theory suggested that he might have been the same person as Makhir ibn Habibi al-Narboni, Nasi and maybe also the same as Natronai Ibn Habibai, Exilarch of Pumbeditha & Almeria. This line is a modern academic theory, rejected by every other scholar who has examined the evidence.

3. Through James "the Just" and Joses ben Joseph, the brothers of Jesus. These are all modern inventions by pseudo-historians who speculate that there is a secret bloodline suppressed by the Roman Catholic church. There are dozens of variations and many conflicts because each writer constructs his own fantasy. Almost all of these lines go through the early Frankish kings or the early Welsh kings.

looks like I still connect to him via a Welsh line - http://www.geni.com/path/William+de+Ferrers+5th+Earl+of+Derby+is+re... any thoughts on this one?

seems to be Him crowned added profiles

for a few hours I actually had a connection which looked plausible...

looks like a shortcut got added on Agnes of Chester, Countess of Derby her father's line, since I was briefly connected to David through a longer line through her mother.

Sorry about that, living Cooley. I was working on this line in the wee hours of the morning, getting the Morfydd line merged and re-worked. Finally quit and went to bed. It looks like you picked it up less than an hour after I stopped working. I'll do some work on it later today.

In my opinion none of the Welsh lines are plausible or legitimate. They are guesswork, using medieval sources.

The logic goes something like this. Dôn verch Mathonwy, {Fictitious, Mabinogion}, the wife of Beli, is said to have been a "near kinsowman" of the Virgin Mary. Oh wait, she was born 100 years too soon. But look: Grail romances say that Beli's grandson had a wife Anna bat Joseph, The Prophetess of Arimathea who was a sister of St. Joseph of Arimathea, so maybe she was also called Anna and they got confused. The poets must have had access to an oral tradition the court historians missed. Maybe Enygeus is Latin for Anna, or something like that. Oh no, that won't work, there is a legend that Joseph of Arimathea was a brother of Anna the Prophetess but that Anna was already an old woman when Jesus was born so the dating doesn't work, and there's already another legend that Anna the Prophetess is the same as the Anna (Hannah) who was the mother of the Virgin Mary. So, if she was Jesus' grandmother it must have been the first Anna after all, and she went to Britain with Joseph of Arimathea after her grandson was crucified, married the British king Beli, and had more children even though she was a great grandmother. But the details don't matter. Something like that has to be true because people in the13th century perfectly preserved an oral history from 1200 years earlier. ;)

Even with all the problems, the Welsh link through Enygeus is likely to stay on Geni in one form or another.

Firstly, the Torah (what some call 'Old Testament') is NOT a history book...it is a book of law(s).

Secondly, great liberties have been taken throughout human history to graft family pedigrees onto a text which is not a history book.

I am bewildered by the frenetic attention being paid to Genealogical paths back to King David. The character of King David is complex...and at times gravely flawed...a man troubled by his times and responsibilities...a man who killed the husband of Bathsheba (Uriah the Hittite) so that he could fulfill his sensual desires.

Personally, I lend little credence to ANY paths, claiming Davidic descent, older than the Hasmonean period...and I even view the Hasmonean period genealogies with a great deal of cynicism. Many people fail to examine the fact that there were four books of Maccabees - not two (2) as is commonly held. And the details vary, subtly, among the many versions of the Syriac and Koine translations. There are no extant Hebrew 'originals' of the Hasmonean period.

I can only guess that the pre-occupation with a Davidic lineage stems from a theological orientation which carries a Messianic predisposition....for the life of me I cannot reason any other motive.

If the motive is to secure, for your family, a position as a potential bearer of a Messiah, then perhaps you should re-examine your own texts and decide whether yours will be a Messiah of the House of Joseph....or of the House of David...one cannot exist without the other.

The one you all seemingly desire to be connected to, the Messianic figure from the House of David, (according to your own texts) CANNOT fulfill his prophesied acts until the Messianic fugure from the House of Joseph announces the coming of the Davidic Messiah.

As you can see, this is not as easy as you might first think...or wich to claim.

Even more vexing is the diversity of Y-DNA of Davidic Claimants. Andrei Kharlap, Adam Brown and I spend a lot of money and time researching genealogies in an attempt to locate potential genealogies which would provide statistical significance to one Haplogroup over another.

But no such statistically significant 'weighting' has yet occurred.

Many Jews trace their heritage to:

the Catalonian Branch of the Babylonian Exilarchs (Shealtiel),

the Andalusian Branch of the Babylonian Exilarchs (Charlap),

the Aleppo and Damascus Branch of the Babylonian Exilarchs (Dayan),

the Palestinian branch of the Babylonian Exilarchs (Abravanel)

But make no mistake, there are other Exilarch Branches that lived in Mosul, Balkh, and Basra.

It pains me to read the mind-bending attempts to craft messiah-centric genealogies, and the vitriol they cultivate.

I am the person who provided citations from three (3) medieval texts which give third-party testimony, that Paloma bat Gedaliah ibn Yahya (a/k/a Yonati), and her offspring were Jews. We do not have video-taped depositions, but we DO have third-party accounts - including accounts written by the Royal Archivist who describes the offspring of Paloma to be Jews. This is as good a collection of documentation as will be found. But it has historically been refuted becasue that would make Paloma the grand-mother of King Ferdinand - the very man who signed the Alhambra Decree - and destroyed over 1500 years of Andalusian Jewry. It is not the first time that a Monarch, with Jewish pedigree, engaged in horrific acts against Jews...in fact it is quite common.

As for Pagano - I am the fool who bothered to articulate, to another geni.com researcher, a theory that Pagano may have many identities due to religious conversion from Judaism to xtianity. But it is only a theory under research and I will not discuss it with anyone on Geni.com any further.

One last point - I possess a personal library of over 1,500 books regarding Jewish History in many geographies. I possess originals and facsimile copies of the Septuagint, Torah, Tanakh, Quran, KJV, Book of Mormon, Book of Enoch, Zohar, Egyptian book of the Dead, and a whole host of other texts which cast light on genealogies and religious community practices for the last 2,000 years.

I have books that trace the history of mathematics from Kingdom of Sumer base-60 sexagesimal through base-10 decimal mathematics.

I have books which trace the evolution of philosophy of science, physics and metaphysics - commencing with Parmenides.

I have books which seeming document the chain from tradition of Babylonian Jewry from David HaMelech through to Aleppo after expulsion from Spain.

I want to be very clear about Zerubavel. On page 20 of the book "Yashir Moshe":

"[Babylonian Talmud] Sanhedrin 37....."and the *sons* of Yehonya were his sons Asir and Shealtiel. He is called Asir because his mother became pregnant in prison. He is called Shealtiel, since God planted him in an unusual manner whereas a woman does not usually get pregnant while standing.

So, in "Yashir Moshe" we are presented a citation from Talmud...we have documentation that clearly denotes two (2) sons of Yechonya:

1) Asir,

2) Shealtiel.

We are even told of the manner in which they were conceived...hence how their names came about.

Thanks for the carefully crafted messages, Jaim, particularly when we know your time is limited right now. I'm particularly pleased because my message was intended to be an introductory overview for assessing claims of Davidic descent, while yours pull in more of the meat.

I'm as surprised as you are by the interest in descents from King David, but I've come to see a different reason for it. King David is one outstanding figure from the distant past that many users recognize because of our common Judeo-Christian heritage. I don't think it has as much to do with messianic fervor, as with feeling safe on familiar ground after hundreds of obscure kings that no one but historians ever cared about. Basically, he's the unexpected diamond in the sludge pile ;)

You and I agree about Paloma, but in my comments above I felt it is fair to be clear that there is room for honest doubt.

You and I disagree about Pagano, but I will readily concede that I might be persuaded eventually by the case you're building. I"m just not persuaded yet.

And, just so everyone is on notice -- I personally believe it might be possible to make a case for Makhir. I just don't believe that it has yet been made. If anyone ever makes it, it's going to be Jaim.

my path to king David resemebles a lot to s ivanssons path

http://www.geni.com/path/Jan+Fredrik+Fallsen+is+related+to+King+Dav...

Here is the complete English translation of the pertinent text, Talmud Bavli, Chapter 11:

"R. Johanan said: Exile atones for everything. As it reads: "Thus said the Lord, write down this man as childless, as a man that shall not prosper in his days; for no man of his seed shall succeed to sit upon the throne of David, and to rule any more in Judah." And in I Chron. iii. 17, it reads: "And the sons of Yechonyah: Assir, Shealthiel his son."

One Jewish tradition, based upon peshat, holds that Assir was the result of rape, in prison, and Shealtiel was the result of intimate relations between Yechonyah and the mother of Shealtiel (a Jewess). That there were two (2) sons - named for their manner of conception 1) Assir and 2) Shealtiel. This is explains why Zerubavel came upon his name - he was conceived in Babylon - for reasons we do not know why the writers make such a clear distinction regarding the manner of conception and location of such act.

Another Jewish tradition, based upon medieval commentary, explains that Assir and Shelatiel are the same person because, Rashi reasons, that the persians lowered the woman into a prison cell too small to lay down...so she had to stand and she was raped standing up. Therefore, the woman was imprisoned with a man and conceived a child by a fellow prisoner (whether a fellow Jew we do not know). We have no empirical evidence that Persians imprisoned people standing up in a hole (or a well) in the ground. This is inconsistent with the corpus of archaeological research. In addition, this does not explain Assir-Shealtiel's brother Pedayah - nor are we certain Yechonyah was imprisoned with a Jewess...in a time when conquered kings had a ring run through their lower jaw and chained to the throne of the conqueror...for amusement.

Another tradition holds that by Levirate marriage, and the premise that Shealtiel died without any male descendants, leaving his wife a widow. In such a case it was the halachic duty of one of the brothers of the deceased to marry his brother's widow, that he might raise up seed, i.e., posterity, to the deceased brother; and the first son born of this marriage would be legally incorporated with the family of the deceased, and recognized as his son. After Shealtiel's death, his *second* brother Pedayah fulfilled his Levirate duty, and begat, in his marriage with his sister-in-law, Zerubbabel, who was now regarded, in all that related to laws of heritage, as Shealtiel's son, and propagated his race as his heir. In this scenario, Zerubbabel is called in the passages quoted from Haggai and Ezra the *son of Shealtiel*; note that it does not say "Assir-Shealtiel".

Still another tradition holds that according to Chronicles, 1, 3:18-19 Zerubavel is a son of Pedaiah, a brother of Shealtiel.

Love the discussion! In my three years on Geni, this is the first time that I have calculated my path to King David :) I personally don't think we can trust much before 1400 and at most 900 (roughly).

Hattie,

I love it as well.

Speaking personally, I found and entered this discussion only because I saw that someone I follow had posted in it, and since David was being discussed here, I tried to see if/how I was connected to him on geni. I'm skeptical of many of my geni connections prior to 1600, but think it's great that others are trying to at least get rid of the most mythological connections. If that means eventually that no path can be found between myself and David, I'll be just as happy as if a path is found. No messianic delusions here...

Messianic! lol! nope... I´m with those, who are in the conversation, to a. get some true genealogy going on here. b. get their own "good" lines, straight. (even if and when that´s utopic, in most cases, before 1400... )
because, as one mentioned earlier in the thread... he was a popular figure and not only Jews, but Christians too... find in him a common interest.

I am curious - which Christian denominations are interested in Zerubavel and Shealtiel as popular figures?

I attended private Catholic schools because they were the best education available in the areas in which my family lived - never once was the name Zerubavel or Shealtiel mentioned. In fact, we *never once* studied "The old testament" as they called it. However, what I can truthfully say is that I know, very well, Catholicism of the Roman Rite...and the Orthodox Eastern Catholic Rite.

Ancient church orders are wholly uninterested in the books of Jews. In fact, if you carefully study respective xtian versions of "old Testament" (of which there are roughly 3) you will find that the xtian predelection to super-set the original Hebrew Tanach is primarily the result of highlighting where there are differences in pre-Jesus ancient history. Including, in some cases, the inclusion of apocryphal texts that were wholly ignored by Zugot, Tannaim, Amoraim, Savoraim and Gaonim.

Here, in San Jose, I meet with one of the the local Greek Orthodox priests for coffee, a couple of times a year. He refers to me as his token Jew. Generally speaking, he laughs when I start citing my text ("Tanach") with regard to genealogies because he simply refuses to accept any of the laws of the Jews, the heritage of the Jews, or the lineage of King David beyond what is taught in the Gospels. So I called him to ask about how the Greek Byzantines view Zerubavel and Shealtiel - to which I was informed "who gives a damn, those are names from Jewish books. If it is not in my gospels, then I do not care...as for Shealiel and Zerubavel, no one in my church cares since my savior created a new testament...eliminating the old."

To be clear, the contents of the "old testament" of Catholic Rite (46 books) and Eastern Rite church (51 books) and Protestant "old testament" (39 books) do not match contents of my books (24 books of Tanakh). The xtian "old testament" embraces books which are not part of the Babylonian Jewish Tradition.

I have a distant relative, by marriage to a distant cousin, who is a member of Opus Dei - he has never heard fo Zerubavel or Shelatiel...nor any knowledge of it being a part of his catechism.

I have another distant relative, by marriage to a distant cousin, who is a Seventh Day Adventist Minister - I called him a few moments ago to ask him if he has ever taught the Books of Chronicles 1 & 2, and whether he ever taught Nehemiah-Ezra. He has never taught any of his group such texts.

My business partner is a Lutheran from Finland who was educated in Catholic Schools of Montreal. He hever heard of Zerubavel at home or at school.

The "Didache" makes no mention of the genealogies of the 24 books of the Tanach except where the gospels mention it. Funk has shown that the Tanach is not quoted directly, but from the Gospels - the purpose being to ignore the original Hebrew texts. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Didache

"Didascalia Apostolorum" makes liberal use of that early xtian 'scholars' called 'old testament'. In this text xtians are instructed that "Christians must believe in the Trinity, the Scriptures and the Resurrection". More importantly, this book also declartes that the original Law of Moses (specifically the Ten Commandments) is to be observed, but not Talmudic Law or Mishnah. In addition, the text goes on to declare that "Sabbath rest is symbolic", and xtians are instructed to instead treat every day as belonging to the Lord, but not to keep the rest literally.

More to the point, the Gospels of Mathew and Luke differ over who is father of Shealtiel - Matthew says Shealtiel is son of Yehonya (which is correct) while Luke says Shealtiel was son of Neri (for whom we have no record anywhere).

xtian gospels do not uniformly describe the generation prior to Zerubavel, which is vexing since xtian redactors have had nearly 2,000 years to get the stories straight. Curiously, all four gospels agree that Shealtiel is father of Zerubavel; yet the niggling issue of Pedaya simply won't go away...nor will the Jewish Babylonian tradition. By the way, the texts of the Jewish Babylonian Tradition predate the xtian tradition by roughly 800 years.

So, as you can see, I am academically curious...which xtian denominations view Shealtiel and Zerubavel as popular figures in their catechism? If xtians refuse to accept the genealogies of Zerubavel and Shealtiel according to Tanach or Talmud, then how are we to reconcile, and popularize Shealtiel and Zerubavel?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_denominations

Warm regards,

J

Private User

some Christians with Hebrew education at the Gymnasia worldwide to read also the Old testamentic writers properly did some huge effort to translate them too in poems:
* http://www.idagerhardt.nl/

I would point to the names of my Puritan ancestors which represent a broader set of names from Jewish genealogy than the names of my Litvak (Jewish) ancestors. Certainly "Old Testament" (Tanakh) was studied and familiar to certain Protestant groups in the past.

Being the child of a non-practicing Jewish Beatnik poet and a non-practicing, lapsed Christian scientist artist Mayflower descendant of generations of Presbyterians, I personally first encountered Shealtiel and Zerubbabel when studying in Israel, but then I'm not really a poster child for what a Christian upbringing looks like!

Dr. Zerubbabel Endecott son of Gov. John Endicott the first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Salathiel was also in vogue in England and America in that era as a given name.

Justin Durand

sorry, geni-friend, I do NOT agree with your quote :
—I think it's an partly an age thing. In the 60s the Christian churches took a turn toward relevance and social issues, leaving a whole generation without a solid background in their own history—
At least NOT in Europe, for I myself was visiting a PROTESTANT church-also famous for its building now- in the centre of the HAGUE, also the centre of HIPPY's of the SIXTIES with a SCHEVENINGEN-beach nearby and JAZZ-vocals from Naina SIMONE and I was NOT prepairing my marriage with a boy of another era, but my dominee was a representant of the IXTHUS-movements of those days and WE VISITED all other -foreign- churches, moskee, synogogues in this city.... !

jaim-i think you might be a beaufort
- Joan Beaufort, Queen of Scots

Hi Susan
Just interested in this as Joan Beaufort, Queen of Scots is my first cousin 17X removed.
Thanks
Daphne

Daphne, we are "cousins"...Joan Beaufort, Queen of Scots is my 15th Great Grandmother

Hi Susan,

Joan Beaufort is one of my many 15th great-grandmothers via my maternal grandfather's lineage which connect to the Joan Beaufort via -

McDaid of Buncrana, Inishowen, County Donegal (a sept of the O'Doherty)
Buchanan (Scots-Irish of Tyrone, Ulster, Ireland)
Stewart (via Mary Queen of Scots)

J

Correction - Stewart via James I of Scotland, not Mary Queen of Scots.

J