By Dennis Agbo
The Elite Enugu Sports Club was tense in the conversation, when its Chess Conclave section held a maiden annual lecture where it probed the long held view that the Igbo migrated from the Jewish community.
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To dissect the discourse, the club invited an emeritus professor of Anthropology in the University of Nigeria, Nsukka; Peter-Jazzy Ezeh, who cited many books, starting from the 18th century to the present time, to floor the narrative that the Igbo migrated from elsewhere other than Africa, asking Ndigbo to look at the way of Egypt or thereabout, but not Israel.
Prof Ezeh faulted the first educated Igbo, Olaudah Equiano, who was taken away into slavery when he was 12 years and whose comparison of some Jewish cultures such as circumcision with the Igbo made some scholars to toe along Eduiano’s ‘unempirical’ story.
Professor Ezeh was not alone in the assertion. The chairman of the lecture and former Chief Judge of Anambra State, Justice Peter Umeadi (retd) quoted the Arabs as telling the Jews that they (the Arabs) have been suspicious of the Jews because they left their shores as blacks but returned as Whites.
Delivering the lecture with the theme, “Igbo Origin: Facts and Fiction,” Ezeh stated that the claims that the Igbo people migrated from the Jewish world has no empirical or linguistic evidence to support the old narrative, stressing that extensive linguistic comparison shows no link between Hebrew and the Igbo languages.
According to him, the claim that Igbos migrated from Jews does not withstand objective scrutiny. “When compared with Hebrew and Igbo languages with their lexicon, there was nothing showing relatedness as reported by some writers,” he said.
He further explained that for any group to assert that two languages are genealogically related there must be clear similarities in vocabulary, sound and shared origins. According to Ezeh, for one to claim that any two languages are related genealogically, the lexicon of the two languages must coordinate and originate from the same source, sound and meaning. He stressed that Hebrew belongs to the Afro-Asiatic language family, making it linguistically closer to Hausa rather than Igbo.
“Hebrew belongs to Afro-Asiatic language and when it comes to Nigeria, they have Hausa as their relations because Hausa is Afro-Asiatic along with 23 others. This is not assertion or belief but scientific as there is ample, credible, solid evidence. So, if belonging to Hebrew confers any advantage, then it is to the Hausa.
“On basis of credible linguistic research there are some languages in Nigeria, mainly in the north of the country, that belong to the same language phylum as Hebrew but these do not include Igbo. NigerCongo to which Igbo belongs is the largest phylum, spreading practically to all parts of the continent.”
Ezeh stated that the 18th century-manumitted slave of Igbo origin named Olaudah Equiano submitted that the Igbo, like the Jews, practice circumcision and also name their children to reflect circumstances prevailing at the time of their birth; while adultery is taboo to both, and both wash their hands before meals.
“But, not only are these features peculiar to the two peoples. Equiano was not in a position to compare the Igbo with other African peoples. He was only twelve years old when abducted from these parts and sold overseas. He, of course, afterwards converted to Christianity.
“In 2017 the Jews came to Anambra State to report that results of the DNA study they had carried out had shown that Igbos were not Jews. The study was conducted in one of the best laboratories for the purpose in the United States using molecular samples. The finding was straightforward: the result of the samples taken from Nigeria randomly on some people in Igboland bears no semblance to the ones in the database of the laboratory.
“If the Jewish-origin hypothesis served a certain epistemological void-filling purpose in the early days of Igbo contact with European cultures, it does a lot of harm these days that the sciences that can access the truth of this subject are available.
“When European explorers realized that the New World wasn‘t India, the native Americans— millions of people nobody was expecting to find—were explained from a biblical perspective as remnants of the lost tribes of Israel. You could excuse such errors at a point when a science specializing in precise investigations of human genealogies has not come up. Not these days.
“A review of the luxuriant literature on the subject, to show that, from empirical standpoint, it is preposterous to conjecture Jewish origin for the Igbo. I looked at linguistic and biological evidence. There is abundant evidence from studies of the two languages; Hebrew and Igbo, to show that they are not related. After nearly a year of molecular study of the Igbo with a sample collected in situ in Anambra State, Jewish scientists concluded that the two groups are not related.
“Before the civil war any mention of the Igbo and the Jew in one context had always been in the shape of a trope, never in a veridical sense. Serious evidence-driven efforts at studying the origin of the Igbo exclude Israel. Egypt and other provenances within Africa have been suggested,” Ezeh concluded.
Justice Peter Umeadi, former Chief Judge of Anambra State and chairman of the event, said the Igbo people have a distinct cultural, linguistic, and social identity that has remained undeniable for generations. He described the Igbo as resilient, industrious, and consistently at the forefront of development wherever they settle.
Delivering the keynote address, Prince Chukwuemeka Onyesoh, Leader of the Chess-Conclave Section of the Enugu Sports Club, highlighted the purpose of the lecture: correcting misconceptions and promoting accurate cultural knowledge. He said people who did not understand their history risk losing their identity.
Onyesoh noted: “People without knowledge of their past history, origin and culture are trees without roots, noting that those who could not remember their past were condemned to repeat it.”
He urged Igbos to continue celebrating and documenting their heritage, warning that partial knowledge among some elites fuels misinformation.
The Chairman of Enugu Sports Club, Chief Ifeanyi Nweke, commended the organisers and described the lecture topic as timely and essential for reinforcing cultural identity.
Other Igbo present at the lecture included the President of Igbo leaders of Thought, Prof Elochukwu Amucheazi; former spokesman of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Dr. Alex Ogbonnia; former Managing Director of Enugu state Water Corporation, Dr. Martins Okwor; the 2023 Governorship candidate of the Labour Party in Enugu state, Hon. Chijioke Edeoga; among others.
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