Hebrew Israelites practice a theology that says God’s chosen ones — black, Hispanic and Native American people — have strayed and need to be led back to righteousness.
So they post up on street corners in big cities, usually in predominantly black communities, wearing flashy garb — purple shirts or black robes, for instance. They shout, use blunt and sometimes offensive language, and gamely engage in arguments aimed at drawing listeners near.
The attention-grabbing tactics of five of their followers at the Lincoln Memorial on Friday resulted in spectacular consequences. The fringe theology landed in the national spotlight after a viral video surfaced of a group of black Hebrew Israelites profanely clashing with dozens of mostly white Catholic schoolboys wearing “Make America Great Again” caps. That video emerged only after shorter clips posted online showing a confrontation between the students and a Native American elder initially led to heavy criticism of the students.
For the Hebrew Israelites, it was a divine opportunity. Ordinarily, those approached by the group quickly rush by. Though they have been name-checked by Kendrick Lamar in a rap called “Yah,” they have also been denounced by others as a hate group. Provocation is their outreach method of choice. And provoke they did.
“Our God did that to expose what this country is coming to, to expose what we’ve been teaching,” said Shar Yaqataz Banyamyan, one of the men involved in the dispute with the boys.
Dating back more than a century, the theology is difficult to define today because the movement is split into dozens of semiautonomous groups. In general, adherents contend that race does not exist, and so they eschew being referred to as black or categorizing anyone else by race. They group people instead based on what they call nations, believing that there are 12 tribes among God’s chosen people. White people are not among those tribes, they believe, and will therefore be servants when Christ returns to Earth.
The Hebrew Israelites do not have physical churches, with most of their work being done on streets. But the internet is also an integral part of their efforts, and they regularly post their street sermons on YouTube.
If their interaction with the Catholic students seemed like an expression of bigotry toward white people, some of their most vile language is reserved for black people in the communities where they preach.
That, in part, is because they are trying to get through to them, Banyamyan said. He described it like tough love — calling out black people to try to get them to turn their lives around.
“Spare nobody’s feelings,” is a biblical passage he falls back on.
“We use certain tactics,” he said, adding that if you confront passers-by softly, “they don’t respect you.”
Whatever tensions are sparked by Hebrew Israelite teaching, some adherents chalk that up to people being unwilling to accept uncomfortable doctrine.
“A lot of the truths of the Bible, it can be a bit much for people to take,” said Ash Yasharahla, who lives in New York and belongs to a congregation of Hebrew Israelites known as I Am Israel (No Division).
He said he hoped that viewing the full sequence of what transpired at the Lincoln Memorial would be enough to win over supporters.
“It’ll get to them,” he said. “It’ll permeate their minds. As long as the full message is up there, it’s a great thing.”
But what Yasharahla might view as great, others call something else: hate.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks extremist groups, categorized at least 80 groups nationwide that follow Hebrew Israelite theology as hate groups. They account for about a third of the organizations that the center considered black nationalist groups in 2017.
The number of black nationalist groups has been increasing in response to President Donald Trump, said Heidi Beirich, who oversees the center’s tracking of hate groups. These groups are able to use things like the president’s disparaging remarks about predominantly black countries and his abandonment of civil rights changes to recruit new members, she said. They argue that the best response to the evils of government is to separate and form their own institutions, Beirich said.
That is not necessarily a radical idea for many black people. But Beirich said that groups like Hebrew Israelites were also anti-gay, anti-white and anti-Semitic. They believe that they are the actual descendants of Israelites in the Bible, not white Jews.
“These are really fringe movements, and they’re also very different than white nationalist groups that have access to power,” Beirich said. “This kind of thinking arose in reaction to white supremacy and the abuse and exploitation of black people.”
Even though their style might be intimidating, Beirich said that Hebrew Israelites did not have a history of violence.
Nick Sandmann, one of the Catholic school students at the center of the controversy, told NBC that he felt threatened by the Hebrew Israelites. “They were a group of adults, and I wasn’t sure what was going to happen next,” he said in an interview broadcast Wednesday.
To many black people, the Hebrew Israelites are a harmless part of their communities, said Todd Boyd, a professor of race and pop culture at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, one of many cities where the group can be seen working the streets. More alarming to many African Americans, he said, is “seeing a white guy in a ‘Make America Great Again’ hat.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.