Talk:Ishmaelites

Why do you use the Arabic names for these people?

Beacuse it has to be "politically correct". I think they should use the names wriiten in the Bible. Arnie Gov 02:15, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Ishmaelites is mentioned in "Comstock Mining and Minors" by Eliot Lord (written 1882) published by USGS 1883 pg 15. They seemed to be persons without the value of property ownership as the word was used for persons who stole food and provisions seemly with some sort of right to those food and provisions because of proxsimity.

Important point

The Old testatment was written with the Assyrian empire in recent memory, so it only makes sense to link the Jews/Ismaili Arabs to Ashur claiming a prestigous lineage!

• The lineage is Mythical/Legendary the medieval Arabs recognized this and simply began to claim the lineage through Qahtan of the Yemen and Adnan of Hejaz.
• Should the article mention that this is a smei-legendary lineage? Modern studies clerly links the Hebrews to Southern Mesopotamia and the Arabs to varied origins.--Skatewalk 18:27, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Rework

This article needs quite a bit of rework. I've tried to clean up the nonsense and POV polemic and replace with raw facts, but what is there still does not do the topic justice. And why the table with Ishmael's descendant according to the the book of Jashar?? Jashar is largely fable. Kuratowski's Ghost (talk) 02:57, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks to do clean up but please avoide to remove cited statments.--Submitter to Truth (talk) 05:37, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Hi I'm removing it again, the verse doesn't say that the term "Ishmaelites" applied to the descendants of Keturah's children. The verse in Jubilees is correct but does not explain clearly the exact usage of the terms. The verse points out that the descendants of Ishmael and his brothers intermingled but then makes an ambiguous statement "they were called Ishmaelites and Arabians". Looking at this statement in isolation it is not clear how the terms are actually applied. Looking at how the terms are used in the Bible and other works one sees that "Ishmaelites" is used for the descendants of Ishmael, including Ishmaelites who had been absorbed into the Midianite armies at the time of Judges (Midianites are descended from Midian, Ishmael's brother) although eventually the term excludes the Hagrites who became a separate group, while "Arabian" is used only in a later era to mean the mingled peoples of the desert (i.e the early Nabatean Arabians who shouldn't be confused with the modern Arab nation and who are descended from a mix of Ishmaelites, descendants of Keturah and also other tribes not descended from Abraham at all). Kuratowski's Ghost (talk) 10:47, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

My friend,You have no right to remove documented statements according to it's opposition with your original research.If you have any documented facts that supports your opinon. Please simply add it! Here is wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia! And False and Ture is not belong to here. Everything should be documented. Please also refer to WP:NOR.--Submitter to Truth (talk) 18:13, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

What original research? I do have the right to remove statements that are just plain wrong. The verse from Jubilees does say that the term "Ishmaelites" was applied to the descendants of Ishmael's brothers, that is your personal misunderstanding of the verse. Kuratowski's Ghost (talk) 18:35, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

My Friend, as I told before here is Wikipedia! The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. Please refer to WP:NOTTRUTH also. You have no right to remove documented statment that you personally call it wrong! I ask others to help us solve this issue!--Submitter to Truth (talk) 18:51, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

And your statement is not verifiable, its falsifiable, the original statement of the article that "Ishmaelites" are descended from Ishmael is verifiable,e.g. the Merriam-Webster dictionary entry for "Ishmaelite" says "a descendant of Ishmael". Oxford English dictionary says "a descendant of Ishmael, a son of Abraham and Hagar", Encarta says "descendant of Ishmael: in the Bible, a descendant of Abraham's son Ishmael". The article should reflect these mainstream definitions which all agree that the term refers to descendants of Ishmael and not your invented interpretation that it includes descendants of his 6 brothers which is not actually supported by the verse you quote form Jubilees. Kuratowski's Ghost (talk) 19:05, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

My Friend you have the right to add the above mentioned descriptions. And I have the right to add what is descrbed by The Book of Jubilees which is in my opinion the most complete and the oldest definition I have ever seen:

Book of Jubilees 20:13 And Ishmael and his sons, and the sons of Keturah and their sons, went together and dwelt from Paran to the entering in of Babylon in all the land which is towards the East facing the desert. And these mingled with each other, and their name was called Arabs, and Ishmaelites.

Also according to some scholars in Bible Medianites also known as Ishmaelities according to Gen 37:28 which confirms the above definition.

Please refer to NET Bible and Tektonics site for it.

So that is not my invention! The current manuscripts of the book of Jubilees is older than the manuscripts of Bible itself!

I still humbly ask for help from our silent audiences.--Submitter to Truth (talk) 20:08, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

You have a very strange understanding of what that verse is saying. Consider the following statement: "The people of Sweden, Norway and Denmark intermingled and their descendants were called Swedes, Geats, Danes and Vikings." That would be a correct statement but it would not mean that all Vikings were called Danes. Yet that is the type of conclusion that you are drawing from the passage. Kuratowski's Ghost (talk) 01:46, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

The NET Bible site you mention above shows that the majority view is that Ishmaelites means descendants of Ishmael, the old and outdated ISBE provides one commentators confused discussion which is contradicted by other commentators, the Tektonics site which is generally not regarded as a reliable source shows the same confused discussion. The problem goes back to smartass criticisms of the Bible in the 19th century which claimed that the Bible was inconsistent about whether Joseph was sold to Midianites or Ishmaelites and knee jerk reactions by apologists who tried to claim that the terms were interchangeable without actually looking at how the story is presented in other texts and how traditional commentators have viewed it. The story as recounted in the Bible as well as other Jewish works is that the brothers planned to sell Joseph to Ishmaelites they saw in the distance. But then he was stolen from the pit by passing Midianites who sold him to the Ishmaelites and then the brothers found him missing. The Ishmaelites sold him into Egypt via the Medanites. This is what the account in Genesis 37:25-36 actually says. Nowhere does it say Ishmaelites = Midianites = Medanites and indeed in other accounts of the story in Jewish literature it is absolutely clear that there are three different groups involved, long before 19th century pseudo-scholarship came along. Kuratowski's Ghost (talk) 02:08, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

I entered the exact verse in the article with the exact wording that in the verse. Strange understanding is for those that change the scriptures according to their personal beliefs!!!--Submitter to Truth (talk) 06:00, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Secular history

Does secular history agree that the modern day Arabs are descendants of the Ishmaelites? I realize that Islamic theology claims they are, but is this belief accepted as historical fact? The article is rather silent on the historicity of this claim. --B (talk) 22:24, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

I have the same question... 77.251.46.60 (talk) 11:08, 18 June 2011 (UTC)