Y-chromosomal Aaron - Samaritan Kohanim

Samaritan Kohanim

The Samaritan community in the Middle East survives as a distinct religious and cultural sect and constitutes one of the oldest and smallest ethnic minorities in the world, numbering just less than 700 members. As a religious sect, reportedly, the Samaritans broke away from the mainstream Judaism around the fifth century BCE but according to Samaritan accounts it was the southern tribes that left the original worship set forth by Joshua. The Samaritans have maintained their religion and history to this day. Samaritans claim to descend from the Biblical Israelite tribes of Ephraim, Menashe and Levi.

Since the Samaritans maintain extensive and detailed genealogical records for the past 13–15 generations (approximately 400 years) and further back, it is possible to construct accurate pedigrees and specific maternal and paternal lineages. Y-Chromosome studies have shown that the majority of Samaritans belong to haplogroups J1 and J2, while the Samaritan Kohanim belong to haplogroup E1b1b1a (formerly known as E3b1a). However, the last member of the Samaritan High-Priestly family, which claimed descent from Eleazar, the son of Aaron, died in 1623 or 1624. There was a time in later periods like the 17-18th centuries that Samaritan sages by mistake wrote to European scholars that their priests are from Uziel b. Kehat. But Samaritan sources, chronicles and lists of lineage connecting the Samaritan Priests of the last 387 years since 1624 to Itamar b. Aaron the nephew of Moses, meaning that they are all from Aaronic origin. All Samaritan Priests of the present are linked to the father of the family that lived in the 14th century 'Abed Ela b. Shalma that was the House of 'Abtaa from Itamar, son of Aaron. Since that date the priest has called himself "Ha-Kohen Ha-Lewi", which means the Priest-Levite, instead of "Ha-Kohen Ha-Gadol", a title which referred to the High-Priest as in previous times.

The biblical tradition of the Cohen family living among the Samaritans is found in 2 Kings 17:27–28, where it indicates that only one Israelite Cohen was sent back from exile from Assyria by the King of Assyria to teach those living in the Northern Kingdom of Israel (Samaria). This suggests why some Samaritans may claim association of haplogroup E3b1a with the biblical Kohanim. In the same period only 27,290 (Annals of Sargon)of the ten Northern Tribes were exiled to Assyria, the Assyrians relocated those non-Israelites to the region around Samaria, explaining why those claiming to be Leviim or Kohanim were actually Syrians, who appointed other non-Israelites as priests ("Kohanim") from their own people.

Thus far, no claims of ancestry of coming from the Levite tribe for male haplogroups outside of the "J" series can be scientifically substantiated because the mutation of haplogroups is so slow that no one coming from the family of Levi could have another haplogroup.