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Cuthites from the Tribe of Benjamin

The origins of the Samaritans are shrouded in the mists of time and controversy

The Jews’ Version

According to biblical tradition, when the northern Kingdom of Israel (also known as the Kingdom of Samaria, after its capital) was destroyed around the year 700 BCE, the king of Assyria exiled the ten tribes inhabiting the area, and settled other exiles in their place: “And the king of Assyria brought men from Babylonia, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and settled them in the cities of Samaria instead of the Children of Israel” (II Kings 17:24). According to this account, a priest from the Israelite community-in-exile was brought in to teach the new population “the laws of the Lord of the land” (ibid. 17:27)

A late-nineteenth-century high priest with a Samaritan Torah Scroll, illustration from Through Samaria to Galilee and the Jordan by Josias Leslie Porter, London, 1889 — A late-19th-century high priest with a Samaritan Torah scroll. From *Through Samaria to Galilee and the Jordan* by Josias Leslie Porter, London, 1889

Although the Bible lists these “new immigrants” beginning with the contingent from Babylonia, the Talmudic Sages defined the second group, from Cuthah (today south-eastern Iraq), as the representative one, and accordingly termed all the new inhabitants “Cuthites.” Living in the environs of the abandoned Israelite capital of Samaria, they were also known as Samaritans. For nearly a thousand years, until the time of Rabbi Abbahu (the leading rabbinical luminary in Caesarea), their conversion to Judaism was considered questionable. The authorities could not decide whether the Cuthite-Samaritans had truly joined the Jewish people, or were merely paying lip-service to the traditions of the previous inhabitants of the land – for fear of the lions which had attacked them on arrival – while continuing their idolatrous practices in secret. This latter opinion prevailed, although both the biblical account and rabbinic literature record intermarriages between these “foreign”, non-Jewish Samaritans and the neighboring Judean Jewish communities.

The Samaritans’ Story

The Samaritans, for their part, consider themselves an integral part of the Jewish people. We endured the Egyptian exile as one people, followed Moses through the desert together, and together conquered the Land of Canaan under Joshua’s leadership. The Samaritans claim to be descended from the tribes of Joseph (Ephraim and Menasseh) and define their priests as descendants of the original Levites. Until about fifty years ago, one Samaritan family could trace its lineage back as far as the tribe of Bimim – as the Samaritans pronounce the name Benjamin. They maintain that the Jews are originally from the tribe of Judah (apart from the priests and Levites, who come from the tribe of Levi), implying that the Jews are the descendents of exiles from the southern kingdom of Judea, while they themselves are remnants of the northern Israelite kingdom.