Paul Goble
Staunton,
November 20 – It is almost universally the case that nations claim that they originated
in the distant past – or at least earlier than those around them. Now, the
Chechens are getting involved in this competition and claim they are descendants
from Noah, even suggesting that archaeologists have found the Biblical figure’s
ark in the mountains of the republic.
In
the Prague-based Caucasus Times, political analyst Yevgeny Romanovsky points
out that Chechens call themselves “Nokhcho,” which literally means “people.”
But many Chechens argue that its more precise translation is “people of the race
of Noah” (caucasustimes.com/ru/mif-o-noevom-kovchege-i-chechencah/).
They believe that Biblical
references to the region where Noah’s ark came to rest correspond with their republic;
and “some investigators go even further: they seriously assert that the
influence of the Chechens can be traced through all stages of the development of
humanity,” Romanovsky continues.
Such claims often taken on a
hyperbolic form. Ruslan Khaskhanov, a
Chechen scholar at the University of Copenhagen, says that he has found traces
of the influence of the Chechens in Scandinavia. And Chechen writer Said-Khamza
Nunuyev has written several books advancing the idea that “the Chechens are the
most ancient people on earth.”
That has led some Chechens to
suggest that the prophet Moses led into the wilderness not Jews but het
ancestors of the Chechens and even that “when dying on the cross, Jesus Christ
spoke Chechen.” And now such outlandish
notions are attracting more attention given that Chechen archaeologists claim
to have found the remains of Noah’s ark on Chechen territory.
Moscow’s Dozhd television channel recently interviewed Marat Aslakhanov, one
of the promoters of the idea that Noah left his ark in the mountains of
Chechnya. (Aslakhanov also believes that
the Tyroleans in Northern Italy are a Chechen tribe that has forgotten its “’true
origins.’”)
Aslakhanov’s ideological soul mate,
the Chechen artist Mukhammad Yaskhanov, has an online group with 6,000 people
who actively discuss whether Noah chose to start humanity anew in Chechnya first
of all, Romanovsky says. Their ideas are also finding support in the government
of Ramzan Kadyrov.
Dzhambulat Umarov, the nationalities
minister, has provided funding for the preservation of the ark’s remains. And
Chechen mufti Salakh Mezhiyev supports the Noah theory as well. In Arabic, he says, “Noah is called Nukh or
Nokh, and true Vaynakhs know that the real name of the Chechens is the Nokhs –
in other words, the sons of Noah.”
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