The Fault In Pashtun History!
Time and again, I have come across several myths about the origins of Pashtuns. Frankly, most of it is mere fantasy and folklore rather than facts and logic. For a long time, I believed in the theory that Pashtuns are the 12th lost tribe of Israel.
However, I had the pleasure of meeting a very qualified Pashto historian whose work in the field of Pashtun history is mind-blowing. In the last 40 years of her life, she has traveled across South Asia and Europe to study the origins of the Pashtun nation. We had a small conversation, at the end of which, she gifted me a very well-researched book. That book opened up my mind, and helped remove this vagueness out of the history we’re being told by our elders. That was quite a long book, so I am just cutting it all short for those who want to get a quick lesson on the history of Pashtuns.
Let’s start with this baseless story of “Qais Abdur-Rasheed” being the first Pashtun and father of modern Pashtuns. It was nothing more than a myth propagated at the times of the Mughal Emperors by a local religious figure named “Mullah Nimat-Ullah Harwi”. The book he wrote is widely available in the market and is titled “Tareekh Khan Jehani Urf Mukhzan-e-Afghani.”
According to this myth, Qais went to Medina with 40 of his companions. There he accepted Islam and married the daughter of Hazrat Khalid bin Waleed (R.A). He also spoke fluent Pashto, and that both Hazrat Khalid bin Waleed and Qais were Israelites.
To know what’s wrong with this history, we have to use our common sense & reasoning
According to Islamic historians, Hazrat Khalid Bin Waleed (R.A) was not an Israelite. Hazrat Khalid Bin Waleed (R.A) was an ethnic Arab and a respectable person with a strong position in his tribe. Also, if we are to believe that Qais was the first Pashtun father to Sarban, Ghilji, Ghurghusht, and Karlani; then what became of his 40 companions who according to this folklore went with him to Medina. Weren’t they Pashtuns too? Similarly, if we are to believe that Qais was the first Pashtun ever, this would make him the grandfather of Afridis.
So if Afridis are his decedents, then how come Greek Historians were able to mention Afridis ad “Aspassi” of Afghanistan more than 1000 years before the arrival of Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H). Something is seriously wrong with the dates here isn’t it?
Being a rational person, you would be able to understand the faults in the timeline of this historical folklore theory. Now let’s dig into some facts about this history, and why was it developed in the very first place.
Mughals took over India from Lodhis and for the coming centuries, Mughals and Iranians were allied with each other and both had a rivalry against Pashtuns. There was ongoing propaganda against the origins of Pashtuns by Mughals and Iranians claiming Pashtuns to be a “Bastard Race” and I don’t wanna get into the details of that.
Mullah Nimat-Ullah was sent back to Afghanistan by a few Pashtun members of the Mughal court from where he came up with not only a Shajrah (tree chart) but this fact-less story too. All of this was a struggle to stop the defamation campaign against the Pashtuns of Afghanistan.
Ancient History & References of Pashtuns
The tribe of Afridis is mentioned in Greek history as “Aspasii” or in Pashto “Apridi” of Afghanistan. Long before Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H), the term used for Pashtoons of Afghanistan was “ Pactyans.” We served alongside Cyrus the Great, founder of the Achaemenid Empire (550–330 BC), also called the First Persian Empire. It was an empire well established in Western Asia, the largest empire in ancient history, spreading across the Balkans and Eastern Europe in the west, to the Indus Valley in the east.
Pashtuns helped Cyrus conquer Greece as a part of his military as he controlled Afghanistan back then. Pashtuns were still the same back then. They followed the Zoroastrian religion and loved to die in the name of religion. They were part of the very first clash of civilizations. East vs West. Persians vs Greeks. According to ancient Hebrew Scriptures, Pashtuns played a great role in the destruction of Athens.
Later, when Alexander the Great rose to power, he took revenge on the Persians for centuries of their expeditions and the bloodshed of the Greek people. Alexander, interestingly, was a student of Persian history and their legendary kings like Cyrus the Great, Darius, and so many others in the lineage. At the beginning of his conquest, he defeated the last Persian emperor in a single battle. After that, he turned his attention towards Afghanistan.
Instead of conquering it in a day, he fought there for 10 years. It is believed that he married the daughter of a local feudal lord named “Rana.” Those 10 years were the most difficult in his entire campaign, and all the bloodshed was his revenge against the atrocities committed by Pashtuns in Athens a few centuries ago. Afghanistan was still the same back then. Graveyard of Empires. That was the time when this quote from Alexander became legendary
“May God keep you away from the venom of the cobra, the teeth of the tiger, and the revenge of the Afghans” — Alexander the Great.
So are we the 12th Lost Tribe?
The myth that Talut, the Israelite King back in the day had two wives, and Afghana was a grandson of one of these wives is also a false story quite famous in the Pashtun community. The researcher I followed never found any reference to the term Afghana, nor this specific story in all the Hebrew books and biblical scriptures he studied.
This clarifies that Pashtuns are not the 12th lost tribe of Israel. After the victory of Nebuchadnezzar, first, the Jews went through torment. But later on became prosperous and except for a couple, the rest of the tribes of Israel turned their back on religion. The one who still firmly believed and practiced Judaism as a figure of speech started saying “the tribes of Israel are lost.” It had nothing to do with the destruction of the Kingdom of Judah and then the dispersion of the 12 tribes of Israel.
King Cyrus the Great who conquered Babylon during his campaigns freed the Jews, and a lot of them settled in Persia and Afghanistan (a part of the Achaemenid Empire). King Cyrus is remembered as a Messiah, even in Biblical Scriptures. He liberated the Jews from slavery following the destruction of their empire by Nebuchadnezzar or Bakht-Nasar.
The fact that there remain similarities in the genetic code of Pashtuns and Jews is not a piece of evidence because they lived together in the same region. Intermarriages are natural. Pashtuns share 10%-20% of their D.N.A. with Irish, Scottish, Welsh, Scandinavian and Eastern Europeans. This rejects the claim that Pashtuns are the direct descendants of the Jewish tribes. In fact, there is no need to associate Pashtuns with any ancient civilization. Pashtuns are Indo-Aryans native to Afghanistan, and a nation of their own.
To strengthen this narrative, excavations of prehistoric sites suggest that early humans were living in what is now Afghanistan at least 50,000 years ago. The whole narrative of relating Pashtuns to a specific race is false. Also, I don’t agree with the notion of Pashtuns belonging to just a single bloodline. It’s just simply not possible. Many nations have come here, lived here, and left Afghanistan. Being a Pashtun is more like following the code of this ancient culture, rather than being born with a mythical pure bloodline.
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I have collected this information from a book written by a Pashtun historian Saad-Ullah Khan Jan Barq, who spent 30 years of his life traveling across the world searching for the origins of Pashtuns. In his journey, he had to learn Hebrew, Greek, Arabic as well as Sanskrit to study ancient references and scriptures of Torah, different biblical histories, and also Rig Veda. In total, he referenced 136 sources from different cultures and different histories. All of it might not be a hundred percent reality, but it sure is more logical than what our elders are teaching us.
