Exposing Lies Hidden In History
A book has just been printed by a new Anglo-Israel writer, James Jensen, of Texas. An easy to read, well-flowing work, it is titled, “More Than Free: Exposing the Lies Hidden In History,” and is a hefty 561-page paperback from Dorrance Publishing Company. In it the author traces his family history through a visit to Denmark, and then carries that history back through time, step by step, to the days of the biblical patriarchs. Along the way we have an interesting in-depth history lesson, including Israel in the Nile Delta, the Danite explorations of the Mediterranean and Europe, the conquest of Canaan, the Middle Bronze Age Empires (1440 BC), the Greek and Trojan refugees to Denmark and Ireland (1200 BC), the rise of Israel (1100 to 750 BC), the Parthian connection, and the Israelites scattered by land and sea to Europe, the British Isles, and America. Along the way the author also brings history alive through the personal trials and travails of his own ancestors in early America and Denmark down through the two world wars. The reader will come away with a much deeper knowledge of biblical and European history and its relationship to our world today.
The book utilizes the prior writings and research of a number of past and present British-Israel writers, including Howard B. Rand, Dr. E. Raymond Capt, Sidney Bristowe, W.H. Poole, Isabel Hill Elder, W.H. Bennett, and Steven M. Collins. Many older prior works are now out-of-print and unobtainable, and Jensen’s book allows modern readers to sample the research of a variety of scholars of bygone days. number of mainstream scholars are accessed as well, such as the famous academics Dr. Cyrus Gordon and George Rawlinson.
The author’s interest in his biblical heritage was aroused as a young man when a guest speaker in his Lutheran Church gave “the first interesting sermon that I had ever heard.” He learned that “there is more to God’s word than I had expected or had been taught.” We could wish that more young people would have an awakening of that kind of interest in uncovering the truth of our heritage.
The author professes ignorance of the Historicist year-for-a-day system concerning the “seven times” prophecies of Scripture. This is an important subject in the struggle against cultic Dispensational Futurism and is covered concisely in the book, The Story of Celto-Saxon Israel, pages 52-55, newly reprinted by CBIA.
Jensen holds to the Kenite theory propounded by the late Pastor Arnold Murray of Shepherd’s Chapel in Arkansas. According to the followers of this belief, the tribe of Kenites in the Bible are the descendants of Cain, some of whom—by a never explained means—survived (an apparently localized) Noah’s flood and are causing havoc in the Mideast to this day. Proponents of this belief that I have met have some differing views on who these people are in the world today, which has seemed to me somewhat dependent upon their personal prejudices. This is discussed only briefly in the book.
There are a number of well-designed maps and charts in this book. A chart showing the areas of ancient Israel exiled in each of the successive Assyrian conquests is interesting and helpful. However, as a minor point, the dating used has been revised by modern scholars. The exile of the trans-Jordan tribes recorded in 2 Kings 15:29 is now dated to 732 BC, not 745 BC as in many older history texts. Similarly, the Assyrian attack by Sennacherib on Judah is now dated to 701 BC, not 713 BC. (Jensen, p. 178). Assyrian King Sennacherib (Sin-aḫḫe-eriba) did not take the throne until the death of his father, Sargon, in 705 BC. The older British-Israel books from a century or so ago also often have dates now considered incorrect, showing the problem with simply reprinting old works without corrections and needed updates of newer information. The division of the two houses in the time of Rehoboam of Judah and Jeroboam of Israel was formerly given as 975 BC in many old works, but is now redated to about 925 BC. This dating issue of course has little bearing upon the events themselves described.
A disagreement I have is with the author’s statement, “Semitic is not a language, but a genetic line, at first a family, then a tribe, and finally a race…. All descendants of Shem are called ‘Semites’…” (p.3) The famed Christian scholar, Dr. Henry Sayce, stated, “The ‘Semitic Race’ owes its name to a confusion of ethnology with philology. A certain family of speech, composed of languages closely related to one another and presupposing a common mother-tongue, received the title of ‘Semitic’ from the German scholar Eichhorn…But whatever justification there may have been for speaking of a Semitic family of languages there was none for speaking of a Semitic race. To do so was to confound language and race, and to perpetuate the old error which failed to distinguish between the two.” (Races of the Old Testament, p.69) Dr. Sayce added, “…there are members of the Semitic race who do not speak Semitic languages, and speakers of Semitic languages who do not belong to the Semitic race.” (p.70) As Dr. Sayce and other scholars have shown, there is much confusion today concerning the Jewish people and the misnamed “Semitic race.” The popular description of Israel and anti-Semitism as being limited to the Jewish people is not genetically correct.
This is not to detract from an overall interesting tour of biblical history contained in this new book by James Jensen. The “lies hidden in history” in the title of the book of course refers to the cover-up of the identity of the modern descendants of the lost tribes of Israel. New works such as this, from new authors, help in the effort to uncover the truth of our heritage, identity, and responsibilities as God’s people.
