Yohannes, All the abrahamic faiths went through points of major expansion and that has to do with proselytizing. There is no way the Jews of Habesha, to the former Jews in Somalia, to the Yamanis, jewish kingdoms in North Africa, to the jewish Kingdom in Ukraine, and Jews all over the middle east, are the same people. Just because they are not proselytizing (even though for the most part they have lost their faith), doesn't mean they weren't before.
Again, Judaism is not a proselytizing religion. Try to read up a little on the history of the Jewish people and you'll understand why there's Jews from so many different backgrounds from around the world. Hint: it's because of the two major expulsions of the Jewish people from their homeland in Israel in history.
The first time was in Biblical times when the Babylonians came and conquered and enslaved the Jewish people in Babylon (if you listen to any reggae music, that's what all the lines singing about Babylon are from). The Babylonians at the time intermingled with the Jews in Israel, starting with Jewish King Ahab marrying the Babylonian pagan Princess Eezabal. Because of this, the Kingdom of Israel split into two; the northern 10 tribes under Ahab called the Kingdom of Israel and the southern 2 tribes called the Kingdom of Judea. The 2 tribes that split from the 10 didn't want to mix with the Babylonians so they remained Jewish and kept the Laws of G-d. The other 10 became pagans and began worshipping false gods and were later wiped out when the King of Babylon waged war upon them when Prophet Eliyahu was sent and got the Babylonian Princess killed by divine intervention.
The second time was in more modern times, when the Romans expelled the Jews from their homeland after a series of revolts and wars against their pagan occupiers. The pagan Roman occupiers persecuted the Jews and ended their Jewish kingdoms when they conquered it around the time of Jesus. The Roman response to Jews fighting against the occupiers was to send a massive Roman military force headed by the future emperor Titus. He went on to desecrate and loot the Second Temple and burnt it down along with the rest of Jerusalem.
During the first expulsion, the Jews who were taken to Babylon eventually settled there, and the majority of the Jews stayed there when Ezra came to take the Jews back to Israel. Persia (successor to Babylon) was a great state at the time like Rome and had many satellite states (127). The Jews of Persia went on to move around Persia and its satellite states, from Hodu (the Biblical name for India) to Kush (the Biblical name for Ethiopia).
The Jews have been wandering peoples ever since and have settled and married among different peoples but always kept the Laws of G-d and the Sabbath, otherwise they'd be lost and lose their identity as Jews. This became double-edged as this differentness and unwillingness to assimilate fully with the other societies caused many of the peoples they stayed with to view them as outsiders and they developed hatred and prejudices against the Jews. Like in Ethiopia as I mentioned in this thread: (
viewtopic.php?f=18&t=326577&p=4140927#p4140927 ). Islam and Christianity are the main two religions today that have spread by conquering peoples and forcing them to accept religions or face heavy penalties that included death. That the Jews resisted strongly against this didn't help in how they were treated by both religions (hint: pretty terribly in many cases).
The Jews despite being away from Israel, never forgot their homeland and always kept their Torah and the Laws of G-d, no matter if they were Indian Jews or Ethiopian Jews or Jews living in North Africa, Persia or elsewhere. Even if you want to go there, the proof is in the pudding as they say, with extensive studies done on the DNA origins of Jews from around the world. Besides just the DNA, the stringent and complex rules surrounding Judaism have been kept for thousands of years, no matter where Jews have settled.
Jewish sages would have philosophical debates with the Romans, Greeks, and Babylonians (which was common then) to defend their religion from other philosophies which were attracting many people. A small number of people might've converted from these, if you want to consider that proselytizing, but otherwise Judaism throughout its thousands and thousands of years of existence hasn't been a proselytising religion.
