The Lost Tribes Institute treats Scripture as anthropology's foundational text. Long before the word anthropology existed, the Bible recorded one people's customs in close detail over a thousand years. It covers their food laws, purity rules, marriage and inheritance, festivals and calendar, priesthood, tribal structure, warfare and burial. Genesis 10 adds a table of nations that tries to place every known people in one family tree.
A person who knows that record intimately carries a detailed reference set. When they meet a people who circumcise on the eighth day, set women apart after childbirth, keep a first-fruits festival, name towns of refuge, marry a dead brother's widow, or carry a sacred chest into battle, they recognize a pattern. An observer without that knowledge would see unrelated local customs. The comparison is only possible for someone who knows both sides well.
The history on this map bears that out. Almost every claim here was first noticed by someone steeped in Scripture:
- 1683
- William Penn among the Lenape
- 1775
- James Adair among the Chickasaw, Cherokee, Choctaw, Creek and Catawba
- 1800s
- Missionaries among the Karen, Māori and Assyrians
- 1937
- Thomas Torrance among the Qiang
- Today
- Arimasa Kubo in Japan; Margot Crossing and Richard Hewitt of the Lost Tribes Institute, from Kyrgyzstan to Mizoram; also the researcher Howard Chung
The Institute's founder, Margot Crossing, has carried this method across Asia. She traces a chain of “lost book” peoples, from the Kyrgyz through the Q'iang of Sichuan to the Karen, Chin, Kuki and Mizo, who each remember losing a sacred book and several of whom name their ancestor Manas, Manasi or Manmasi. Of the hill peoples and the Q'iang she writes:
“All of them had ‘Israelitish’ customs and folklore.”
Margot Crossing, “Mizoram: Lost Tribe of Israel”
Her conclusion from the oral histories, presented at the Bishkek symposium in 2019:
“No doubt these people of ‘The Lost Book’ are also people of ‘The Book’.”
Margot Crossing, “Lost Book Peoples” (2019)
The same happened when indigenous readers received the Bible in their own language. Mizo, Igbo, Zulu, Fijian and Ga readers recognized their own grandparents' customs in its pages, often before any outsider suggested a link.
Scripture also tells its readers to expect this. It says the northern tribes were settled in Halah, on the Habor river in Gozan, and in the towns of the Medes (2 Kings 17:6). It warns that Israel would be scattered from one end of the earth to the other (Deuteronomy 28:64). It promises a regathering from the islands of the sea and the four corners of the earth (Isaiah 11:11–12). A reader who takes these words seriously goes looking for remnants far from the land of Israel.
The strongest comparisons are specific rather than general, come in clusters rather than one at a time, and were recorded before missionaries arrived. Critics argue that some likenesses come from ways of life many peoples share, such as herding, clan loyalty and sacrifice, or from ideas missionaries brought. Each entry below records who made the claim and when, so readers can weigh each case for themselves.
Watch the Institute's own presentations of this approach, from the Lost Tribes Institute channel:
See 2 Kings 17:6 · Deuteronomy 28:64 · Isaiah 11:11–12 · Ezekiel 37:15–22 · Hosea 1:10–11 · Genesis 10 · and The promised return below
Lost Tribes Institute
