 Title page from the 1823 printing | |
| Author | Ethan Smith |
|---|---|
| Original title | View of the Hebrews: Or the Tribes of Israel in America |
| Language | English |
Publication date | 1823 |
| Publication place | United States |
| Text | View of the Hebrews at Wikisource |
View of the Hebrews is an 1823 book[1] written by Ethan Smith, a Congregationalist minister in Vermont, who argued that Native Americans were descended from the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel, a relatively common view during the early nineteenth century.[2] Numerous commentators on Mormon history, from LDS Church general authority B. H. Roberts to Fawn M. Brodie, biographer of Joseph Smith, have noted similarities in the content of View of the Hebrews and the Book of Mormon, which was first published in 1830, seven years after Ethan Smith's book.
- ^ Ethan Smith published a second edition in 1825. BYU Studies; Link to pdf.
- ^ "Although not predominant, the lost tribes theory did appeal to religious thinkers eager to link Indians to the Bible. From the seventeenth century onward, both Christians and Jews had collected evidence that the Indians had Jewish origins." Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005), 96.