Jesus In India — Page 120
120 J e s u s i n I n d i a The Civil & Military Gazette of 23 November 1898 on page 4 under the heading Sawati and Afridi, reproduces a very valuable and interesting paper presented to the Anthropological section of the British Association at one of its recent meetings, which will be read at its winter session before the Committee on Anthropological Research. The Gazette says: The original Pathan or Paktan inhabitants of these western gates of India are recognised in very early history, many of the tribes being mentioned by Herodotus and the historians of Alexander. In mediaeval times the rough uncultivated wilderness of mountains they held was called Roh, and its inhabitants Rohillas, and there can be little doubt that most of these early Rohilla or Pathan tribes were in their places long before the overlying Afghan tribes were thought of. All Afghans whatsoever now counted as Pathans, because they all speak the Pathan language, Pushto, they acknowledge no direct kinship, claiming themselves to be Beni Israel, the descendants of those tribes who were carried captive to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar. All of them have, however, adopted the Pushto tongue, and all recognise the same Pathan code of common civil observances called Paktanwali, which is, in many of its provisions, curiously suggestive both of the old Mosaic dispensation and of ancient observances of the Rajput races. Thus the Pathans, with whom we have lately been so largely concerned, may be divided into two great communities, i. e. tribes and clans such as Waziris, Afridis, Orakzais, etc. who are of Indian origin, and those who are Afghans, who claim to be Semitic and who represent the dominant race throughout our frontier; and it seems at least to be possible that the Paktanwali, which is an unwritten code and which is acknowledged by them all alike, may be of very mixed origin indeed. We may find in it Mosaic ordinances grafted on to Rajput traditions and modified by Moslem custom. The Afghans, who call themselves Duranis and who have done so