[gothic-l] Re: Are EE Jews half-Goths?

[dirk at SMRA.CO.UK]

--- In gothic-l at y..., l_labkovsky at h... wrote:
> --- In gothic-l at y..., dirk at s... wrote:
> > --- In gothic-l at y..., l_labkovsky at h... wrote:
> > >  Being an East European Jew myself I was never satisfied with
the
> > > traditional version of how EE Jews came to Eastern Europe. There
> are
> > > too many inconsistencies with the theory that EE Jews came from
> > > Germany, too many to mention. For one, nobody actually saw
> medieval
> > > German Jews actually arriving in Eastern Europe. My theory is
> that
> > > Ostrogoths when they lived in Ukraine kidnapped women from
> Georgia
> > > which is in the Caucasus and had children with them and these
> > > children actually became the East European Jews. When Ostrogoths
> > went
> > > to Italy these "Mulatoes" stayed behind in Eastern Europe. So
> after
> > > many centuries these German(Yiddish)-speaking people still lived
> in
> > > Eastern Europe but they didn't look like Germans. Therefore
> > everybody
> > > thought that they were German Jews who came from Germany and
this
> > > belief still persists today. This is why EE Jews have
> their "unique"
> > > faces and speak German(Yiddish) without umlauts like UE and OE.
> >
> >
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > I think that there are a number of problems with your theory.
> Firstly,
> >  Yiddish is based largely on Middle High German, i.e. the language
> > spoken in Germany some 600 years ago when the Jews left for
Eastern
> > Europe and not on East Germanic/Gothic. Secondly, there is no
> > mentioning in the sources of Gothic raids to Georgia and even if
> there
> > were, why would they have left their offspring behind in Eastern
> > Europe? And finally, I am neither an expert nor Jewish, but is
> Judaism
> > not first and foremost a religion? How do you think these
> decendants
> > of Gothic/Caucasians obtained their Jewish religion?
> > Hi, Dirk! I'm sure that the Middle High German had umlauts like UE
> and OE but Yiddish has no umlauts. According to the Encyclopedia
> Britannica Ostrogoths spoke German without umlauts also. Also, the
> offspring of the Georgian concubines were treated like second class
> citizens and they lived separately from the pure Ostrogoths. May be
> the presence of these "Mulatoes" forced Ostrogoths to leave Eastern
> Europe in the first place. How would you like to have your
> illegitimate children living close by, quarrelling with you
> constantly. Also, these Gothic/Caucasian offspring became Jewish
> because they couldn't explain their non-German looks while speaking
> German. After so many centuries in Eastern Europe they long had
> forgotten their Ostrogoth "taten"(fahers) and assumed that they were
> Jews from Germany.



Hi again,

I still find that theory unconvincing. Perhaps one of the linguists on
this list can solve the problem. Personally, I think that Yiddish was
based on Middle High German not on East Germanic/Gothic.
Also, I think you said that there is no record of Jews from Germany
migrating to Eastern Europe. But I thought that there was an explicit
invitation by a Polish King Kasimir to the Jews to come to his realm.
Your theory still does not explain why this offspring of Goths and
Caucasions should have became Jews. I don't understand why somebody
who does not look German (as you say) but speaks German would become
so confused by this that the next logical step is to adopt Judaism???
Finally, we are pretty certain that Goths in the Ukraine mixed with
Sarmats, but we have no indication that they abandoned their offsrping
as 'bastards' when they moved on.

cheers
Dirk







> > cheers
> > Dirk


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