Hello father! This question really bothers me. If God created Adam and Eve, and they were Jews, then where did other peoples and races come from? Help my unbelief.
Priest Antony Skrynnikov answers:
Hello, Dimitri!
When God created Adam and Eve, they had no nationality. Modern nationalities and different nationalities were formed after the Flood, and descended from the sons of Noah: Ham, Shem and Japheth. And Adam and Eve are the ancestors of not only the Jews, but also all other peoples. As a nation, the Jewish people were formed and formed much later (after approximately 400 years) - while living in Egypt.
This is how Archpriest Seraphim Slobodskaya describes this event in “The Law of God”:
The multiplied descendants of Noah lived together for a long time in one country, not far from the Ararat Mountains, and spoke the same language. When the human race became numerous, the evil deeds and strife between people increased, and they saw that they would soon have to disperse throughout the entire earth. But before they dispersed, the descendants of Ham, drawing others along with them, decided to build a city and in it a tower, like a pillar, with a height reaching to heaven, in order to become famous and not be subordinate to the descendants of Shem and Japheth, as Noah predicted. They made bricks and got to work. This proud idea of people was displeasing to God. So that evil would not completely destroy them, the Lord mixed the language of the builders so that they began to speak different languages and ceased to understand each other. Then people were forced to abandon the construction they had begun and scatter across the earth in different directions. Japheth's descendants went west and settled throughout Europe. The descendants of Shem remained in Asia, the descendants of Ham went to Africa, but some of them also remained in Asia. The unfinished city was nicknamed Babylon, which means confusion. The whole country where this city was began to be called the land of Babylon, and also the Chaldean. People who settled across the earth gradually began to forget their kinship, and separate, independent peoples or nations began to form, with their own customs and language.
Sincerely, priest Anthony Skrynnikov.
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The unique nature of the Pamirs has always interested researchers and travelers. This harsh mountain region is the homeland of an ancient people about whom almost nothing is known. And if before the twentieth century few people had heard about the mysterious Pamiris, because they lived in remote areas, then, starting from the USSR era, these people were most often confused with Tajiks.
Meanwhile, the inhabitants of the highlands have a special culture, interesting customs and traditions. Who are the Pamiris? Why were they separated by the borders of Tajikistan, Afghanistan, China and Pakistan?
What are they?
The Pamiris do not make it into world news, do not fight for independence, and do not strive to create their own state. These are peaceful people, accustomed to an isolated life in the Pamir and Hindu Kush mountains. Badakhshan is the name of the historical region of their residence.
This ethnic group consists of many nationalities united by a common origin, customs and traditions, religion and history. The Pamirs are divided into northern and southern. Among the former, the most numerous national group are the Shugnans, numbering more than 100 thousand people. There are three times fewer Rushans. There are almost 25 thousand people from Sarykolt, and Yazgulyam people are considered a small ethnic group.
The main part of the southern Pamirs are the Vakhans, about 70 thousand of them. And there are much fewer Sanglicians, Ishkashims and Munjanians.
All these people belong to the Pamir-Fergana subrace - the easternmost branch of the Caucasoid race. Among the Pamiris there are many fair-haired and blue-eyed people. They have oblong faces with straight noses and large eyes. If there are brunettes, they are with light skin. Anthropologists believe that the inhabitants of the European Alps and the Mediterranean are closest to the representatives of the Pamir-Fergana subrace.
Residents of Badakhshan speak languages of the Eastern Iranian group of the Indo-European family. However, for interethnic communication they use the Tajik language, and it is also the language of instruction in schools. In Pakistan, the Pamir languages are gradually being replaced by official Urdu, and in China by Uyghur.
Being representatives of Iranian-speaking peoples, back in the 1st millennium BC the Pamiris were adherents of Zoroastrianism. Then, along with trade caravans from China, Buddhism spread to the highlands. In the 11th century, the famous Persian poet Nasir Khusrow (1004-1088) fled to these lands to escape persecution by Sunni Muslims. This creative person became the spiritual leader of the local population; under the influence of the poet, the Pamiris adopted Ismailism, a Shiite branch of Islam that absorbed some provisions of Hinduism and Buddhism.
Religion significantly distinguishes the Pamiris from their Sunni neighbors. Ismailis perform namaz (pray) only twice a day, while Tajiks and Uzbeks do it five times a day. Since the Pamirs do not fast during the holy month of Ramadan, their women do not wear burqas, and their men allow themselves to drink moonshine, neighboring peoples do not classify these people as devout Muslims.
History of the people
There is no clear answer to the question of the origin of the Pamiris. The history of this ethnic group goes back more than two thousand years. Considering that the inhabitants of Badakhshan belong to the Caucasian race, some researchers are inclined to believe that the Pamiris are the descendants of the ancient Aryans, who remained in the mountains during the Indo-European migration and subsequently mixed with the local population. However, there is no historical evidence for this theory.
According to most experts, several eastern Iranian tribes moved to the Pamirs separately from each other and at different times. It is interesting that their closest relatives were the legendary Scythians - an ancient ethnic group that created a huge empire in the 7th-4th centuries BC, stretching from Crimea to Southern Siberia.
Scientists associate the origin of the Pamiris with several waves of migrations of the nomadic tribe of Sakas, who began to populate the highlands in the 7th-6th centuries BC. Then the ancestors of the Wakhans moved from the Alai Valley, which is located east of Badakhshan. And the future Ishkashim residents moved to the highlands from the southwest. After a linguistic study of their language, scientists consider the Munjans to be remnants of the Bactrian community that survived in remote areas.
The next wave of Saka migration gave birth to the northern Pamirs, who migrated to Badakhshan from the west along the Pyanj River, subsequently breaking up into the Shugnans, Rushans, Yazgulyams and Vanjs. And even later, the ancestors of the Sarykol people moved to their current territories, which are currently part of the Chinese province of Xinjiang. All these migration waves ended by the beginning of our era.
Thanks to the rich deposits of ruby and lapis lazuli, the inhabitants of the highlands were regularly visited by merchants who exchanged household items, household utensils, as well as knives, axes, and other tools for precious stones. Back in the 2nd century BC, caravans from China along the Great Silk Road passed through the Pyanj River valley.
Throughout the history of the Pamirs, various Turkic-speaking tribes, Chinese, Arabs, Mongols, as well as the Sassanid and Timurid dynasties tried to conquer this region. But none of them stayed in the highlands to rule over a handful of tribes. Therefore, even the nominally conquered Pamiris continued to live quietly for a long time, as they were accustomed to.
The situation changed in the 19th century, when Russia and Britain waged an active struggle for influence in Asia. In 1895, the border was officially established between Afghanistan, which was under the protectorate of the British, and the Emirate of Bukhara, which enjoyed the support of the Russians. The two empires divided their spheres of influence along the Panj River, with the Wakhan Corridor going to Afghanistan. Subsequently, the border of the USSR was established there. Neither Moscow nor London cared about the fate of the Pamir peoples, who found themselves literally cut off from each other.
Now the highlands are divided between Tajikistan, China, Afghanistan and Pakistan. The languages of the Pamir peoples are being consistently displaced, and their future remains uncertain.
Customs and manners
The Pamiris have always lived rather isolated. The harsh nature of the highlands, which is located between 2 and 7 thousand meters above sea level, had a significant impact on their life and morals.
Every element of the house here has a symbolic meaning. The Pamiri people's homes are supported by five pillars named after Muslim saints: Muhammad, Fatima, Ali, Hussein and Hassan. They demarcate the men's and women's bedrooms, as well as the kitchen, living room and prayer area. And the four-tiered vault of a traditional home symbolizes the natural elements: fire, earth, water and air.
Previously, the Pamirs lived in large patriarchal families, all relatives ran a joint household, unquestioningly obeying the elder. But later such mini-communities were replaced by ordinary monogamous families. Moreover, among the Pamirs there are marriages between cousins, which is often due to the reluctance to pay a large bride price for a bride from another family.
Despite the fact that Islam has significantly influenced the position of women, marriages among the Pamiris are matrilocal. That is, after the wedding, the newlyweds settle in the house of the bride’s parents.
The traditional occupations of these people are agriculture and animal husbandry. Cows, sheep, goats, horses and donkeys are raised in the highlands. The Pamirs have been engaged in wool processing, weaving, pottery, and jewelry making for many centuries. There were always many skilled hunters among them.
The Pamiri diet usually consists of wheat cakes, sheep cheese, homemade noodles, vegetables and legumes, fruits and walnuts. A poor highlander drinks tea with milk, and a rich one also adds a little butter to the bowl.
The end of the former equality of people.
As a result of the Neolithic revolution, the previous, basically uniform, development of human society across the vast expanses of Europe, Asia, and Africa was disrupted. The new opportunities that appeared then to people allowed them to better and more effectively use the natural advantages of the area in which they lived. On the contrary, where nature and climate were harsh, it was more difficult for people to use new, wonderful achievements.
From now on, the pace of development of individual regions of the world becomes different. The areas that developed most quickly were those with a mild climate and fertile soils, where farmers could obtain huge harvests. This happened in Western Asia, North Africa (Nile Valley), the Mediterranean, India, and China. Almost simultaneously, nomadic pastoral societies were being formed in the steppe regions of Eastern Europe, Siberia, and the Far East.
Both farmers and nomads grew rapidly in population and accumulated wealth. The opportunity arose to separate individual families from the clan communities, which could independently ensure their existence. The former equality of people from the times of the tribal system was becoming a thing of the past.
Tribal leaders, elders, and warriors had the opportunity to get into their hands the best lands for arable land and pasture, collect great wealth in their hands, hire people to protect and increase this wealth, and organize their seizures in foreign territories. Things were moving towards the creation of states.
Even during the Neolithic period, the first states arose in the fertile valleys of the rivers of Western Asia (Euphrates and Tigris), Egypt (Nile), and India (Indus). Later, already in the Bronze Age, states arose in China, the Mediterranean, and among some nomadic peoples of Europe and Asia.
Development proceeded more slowly in the south of Europe and very slowly in the north and east of this continent, in the vast expanses of Asia. Several thousand years later, there was a transition from hunting, fishing, and gathering to agriculture and cattle breeding. The inhabitants of these places lagged behind the inhabitants of the south in everything: in the type of tools and weapons, utensils, dwellings, religious rituals and even decorations.
The folding of nations. Differences in the development of mankind also influenced the formation of separate large groups of people who spoke their own special languages, had their own special customs and even external differences.
Thus, in the northeast of Europe, in the Trans-Urals, and Western Siberia, a type of people began to emerge that became the ancestors of the Finno-Ugric peoples.
In Eastern Siberia, on the undivided steppe expanses of Asia, in the zone where pastoral tribes appeared, the ancestors of the future Mongolian and Turkic peoples began to form.
In the southeast of Europe and adjacent territories, agricultural and pastoral tribes formed, which became the ancestors of the future Indo-Europeans.
Caucasian peoples began to form in the Caucasus.
In all these tribal groups of Eurasia there was rapid population growth. They felt cramped in their former territories, but the Earth was large, abundant and beautiful. People understood this a long time ago. They continued to move from place to place in search of a better life. This means that already in those days not only the isolation of large groups of the Earth’s population began, but also their mixing.
This process was facilitated by the exchange of food products, tools, weapons, and familiarization with each other’s production experience. War and peace continued to march side by side across our planet.
Indo-Europeans.
Scientists call Indo-Europeans the ancient population of vast territories of Europe and Asia, which gave rise to many modern peoples of the world, including Russians and other Slavs.
Where was the ancient homeland of the Indo-Europeans? And why are the ancient ancestors of most European peoples, including the Slavs, called Indo-Europeans? Most scientists believe that such an ancestral home was a large region of Southeast and Central Europe, in particular the Balkan Peninsula and the foothills of the Carpathians, and probably southern Russia and Ukraine. Here, in parts of Europe washed by warm seas, on fertile soils, in sun-warmed forests, on mountain slopes and valleys covered with soft emerald grass, where shallow transparent rivers flowed, the ancient Indo-European community of people took shape. There are other points of view regarding the location of the ancestral home of the Indo-Europeans (see map on p. 26).
Once upon a time, people belonging to this community spoke the same language. Traces of this common origin are still preserved in many languages of the peoples of Europe and Asia. So, in all these languages there is the word “birch”, which means either a tree in general or the name of the birch itself. There are many other common names and terms in these languages.
The Indo-Europeans were engaged in cattle breeding and agriculture, and later began to smelt bronze.
An example of Indo-European settlements were the remains of an ancient village in the area of the middle reaches of the Dnieper near the village of Tripolie, dating back to the 4th–3rd millennia BC. e. (Some scholars do not consider the “Trypillians” to be Indo-Europeans.)
The “Trypillians” no longer lived in dugouts, but in large wooden houses, the walls of which were coated with clay for warmth. The floor was also clay. The area of such houses reached 100–150 m2. Large groups lived in them, perhaps tribal communities, divided into families. Each family lived in a separate, fenced-off compartment with a baked clay stove for heating and cooking.
In the center of the house there was a small elevation - an altar, where the Trypillians performed their religious rituals and sacrifices to the gods. One of the main ones was considered the mother goddess, the patroness of fertility. Houses in the village were often located in a circle. The settlement consisted of dozens of dwellings. In its center there was a corral for cattle, and it itself was fenced from attacks by people and predatory animals by a rampart and a palisade. But it is surprising that no remains of weapons were found in the Trypillian settlements - battle axes, daggers and other means of defense and attack. This means that mostly peaceful tribes lived here, for whom war had not yet become a part of life.
The main occupation of the Trypillians was agriculture and breeding of domestic animals. They sowed large areas of land with wheat, barley, millet, and peas; they cultivated the field with hoes and harvested the crops using wooden sickles with silicon inserts inserted into them. Trypillians raised cattle, pigs, goats, and sheep.
The transition to agriculture and cattle breeding significantly advanced the economic power of the Indo-European tribes and contributed to the growth of their population. And the domestication of the horse, the development of bronze tools and weapons made the Indo-Europeans in the 4th–3rd millennia BC. e. easier to rise in search of new lands, more daring in the development of new territories.
Settlement of Indo-Europeans. The spread of Indo-Europeans across the expanses of Eurasia began from the southeast of Europe. They moved west and southwest and occupied all of Europe to the Atlantic. Another part of the Indo-European tribes spread to the north and east. They settled in northern Europe. The wedge of Indo-European settlements crashed into the environment of the Finno-Ugric peoples and buried itself in the Ural Mountains, beyond which the Indo-Europeans did not go. In the south and southeast they advanced to Asia Minor, the North Caucasus, Iran and Central Asia, and settled in India.
The myths and fairy tales of the peoples of India preserve memories of their ancient northern ancestral home, while in the north of Russia there are still names of rivers and lakes that go back to Sanskrit, the ancient language of India.
During the migrations in the 4th - 3rd millennia BC. e. the Indo-European community, which occupied vast lands from Western Europe to India (hence the name), began to disintegrate. In conditions of constant movement, the development of new territories, the Indo-European tribes became increasingly distant from each other.
Warlike, energetic Indo-Europeans came to where other peoples already lived. These invasions were far from peaceful. Long before the first states and armies appeared on the territory of Eurasia, wars began - our ancient ancestors fought for convenient lands, generous fishing grounds, forests rich in animals. At the site of many ancient sites, traces of fire and heated battles are visible - skulls and bones, pierced by arrows and broken by battle axes, were found there.
Indo-Europeans and the ancestors of other peoples.
Already during the period of settlement of the Indo-Europeans, their interaction and mixing with other tribes began. Thus, in the north-east of Europe they neighbored the ancestors of the Finno-Ugric peoples (now they include many Russian peoples: Mordovians, Udmurts, Mari, Komi, as well as Hungarians, Estonians and Finns).
In Asia and Europe, the Indo-Europeans encountered the ancestors of the Turks and Mongols (their descendants from Russian peoples are the Tatars, Bashkirs, Chuvashs, Kalmyks, Buryats, etc.).
The ancestors of the Ural peoples were located in the region of the Northern Urals. The ancient Altaians formed in Southern Siberia.
Stormy processes took place in the Caucasus, where a population was formed that spoke Caucasian languages (the ancient inhabitants of Dagestan, Adygea, Abkhazia).
The Indo-Europeans, who settled in the forest zone, together with other local inhabitants, mastered cattle breeding and forest farming, and continued to develop hunting and fishing. The population living in the harsh conditions of the forest and forest-steppe lagged behind the rapidly developing peoples of the Mediterranean, southern Europe, Western Asia, and Egypt. Nature at that time was the main regulator of human development, and it was not in favor of the North.
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