The Cuthites is a name describing a people said by the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. '' Josephus Flavius Josephus (; , ; ), born Yosef ben Mattityahu (), was a Roman–Jewish historian and military leader. Best known for writing '' The Jewish War'', he was born in Jerusalem—then part of the Roman province of Judea—to a father of pr ...

to be living in

Samaria Samaria (), the Hellenized form of the Hebrew name Shomron (), is used as a historical and Hebrew Bible, biblical name for the central region of the Land of Israel. It is bordered by Judea to the south and Galilee to the north. The region is ...

around 500 BCE. The name comes from the Assyrian city of Kutha in line with the claim that the

Samaritans Samaritans (; ; ; ), are an ethnoreligious group originating from the Hebrews and Israelites of the ancient Near East. They are indigenous to Samaria, a historical region of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah that ...

were descendants of settlers placed in Israel by the

Neo-Assyrian Empire The Neo-Assyrian Empire was the fourth and penultimate stage of ancient Assyrian history. Beginning with the accession of Adad-nirari II in 911 BC, the Neo-Assyrian Empire grew to dominate the ancient Near East and parts of South Caucasus, Nort ...

after the destruction of the northern Kingdom of Israel around 720 BCE. The label "Cuthites" was a pejorative name for Samaritans in later

rabbinic literature Rabbinic literature, in its broadest sense, is the entire corpus of works authored by rabbis throughout Jewish history. The term typically refers to literature from the Talmudic era (70–640 CE), as opposed to medieval and modern rabbinic ...

. The modern scholarly view is that

Yahweh Yahweh was an Ancient Semitic religion, ancient Semitic deity of Weather god, weather and List of war deities, war in the History of the ancient Levant, ancient Levant, the national god of the kingdoms of Kingdom of Judah, Judah and Kingdom ...

-worshippers in the north of

Ancient Israel The history of ancient Israel and Judah spans from the Israelite highland settlement, early appearance of the Israelites in Canaan's hill country during the late second millennium BCE, to the establishment and subsequent downfall of the two ...

outnumbered post-722 BCE Assyrian settlers, who assimilated into the existing Yahwist population. The "Cuthites", therefore, were not a foreign population in Israel but instead "a branch of Yahwistic Israel in the same sense as the Jews."

Jewish literature

According to the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, the Cuthites were to blame for the postponing of the construction of the

Second Temple The Second Temple () was the Temple in Jerusalem that replaced Solomon's Temple, which was destroyed during the Siege of Jerusalem (587 BC), Babylonian siege of Jerusalem in 587 BCE. It was constructed around 516 BCE and later enhanced by Herod ...

, during the reign of

Cyrus the Great Cyrus II of Persia ( ; 530 BC), commonly known as Cyrus the Great, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Achaemenid dynasty (i. The clan and dynasty) Hailing from Persis, he brought the Achaemenid dynasty to power by defeating the Media ...

. They did this after the

Jewish people Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly inte ...

returned from

Babylonian exile The Babylonian captivity or Babylonian exile was the period in Jewish history during which a large number of Judeans from the ancient Kingdom of Judah were forcibly relocated to Babylonia by the Neo-Babylonian Empire. The deportations occurre ...

, and first agreed to help them, but after the Jews refused, they lied to king Cyrus who postponed the building process. The Cuthites are mentioned in Josephus, ''Antiquities'' Book 11, Chapter 4, as "Cutheans", naming them as those who were brought from Media and Persia and "planted" in Samaria by the king of

Assyria Assyria (Neo-Assyrian cuneiform: , ''māt Aššur'') was a major ancient Mesopotamian civilization that existed as a city-state from the 21st century BC to the 14th century BC and eventually expanded into an empire from the 14th century BC t ...

after he had conquered the Ten Tribes of Israel. Cuth (or Cuthah) is mentioned in the in reference to the gods or idols made and worshiped by different tribes, which took place in the former holy places of exiled Israelites (King James Bible trans.): "And the men of Babylon made Succothbenoth, and the men of Cuth made Nergal, and the men of Hamath made Ashima." There is a

minor tractate The minor tractates (, ''masechtot qetanot'') are essays from the Talmudic period or later dealing with topics about which no formal tractate exists in the Mishnah. They may thus be contrasted to the Tosefta, whose tractates parallel those of the ...

of the Talmud called Kutim that deals with the laws around forbidden and permitted interactions with Samaritans.

References

Ethnic groups in the Middle East {{Asia-ethno-group-stub Samaritan culture and history

Jewish literature

See also

References