NAD, – Africa Germany Network – recently wrote about the Lemba, who live in Zimbabwe and South Africa and, in smaller numbers, in Mozambique and Malawi.
It is something that has long interested me. The Lemba became known thanks to the British historian Dr. Tudor Parfitt, whose research focuses on unknown small Jewish communities or those of Jewish origins in Africa, Asia, and the American states. The Lemba, who are Christians and Muslims, claim to be Jews. This is not recognized by Orthodox rabbis, unlike the Falasha, the Ethiopian Jews.
The Lemba claim to be descended from Jews from the time of the First Temple. They adhere to some laws that point to the Middle East. Genetic Y-DNA analyses have shown that the majority of the Lemba population has paternal origins in this region. Dr. Parfitt discovered the ancient city of Sena in Yemen and the possible origins of the people due to wandering Jewish traders.
It is no secret that the people of southern Africa came from the north. The Lemba tradition says they brought with them a ngoma drum, similar to the biblical covenant, which was carried during wars. Dr. Parfitt found a copy, as he wrote in “The Lost Ark of the Covenant: Solving the 2,500-Year-Old Mystery of the Fabled Biblical Ark (2008).” British television also covered the subject several times, including the Lemas’pride. The ngoma disappeared from the Zimbabwe Museum of Human Science, with the suspicion that Robert Mugabe took it into his own collection.
Several Lemba have embraced Judaism, probably because of their halachic laws, such as those concerning food. Some Lemba even settled in Israel. In 2015, it was reported that the Lemba built their first synagogue in Mapakomhere in the Masvingo district.