Israel

Israel [Heb. yisra'el; Grk. Israēl "he struggles with God"]. A name.

This name is used in the Bible to designate: (1) a person, Abraham's grandson Jacob; (2) the twelve tribes of the Hebrews, all the descendants of Jacob that later became a people and a nation; (3) the ten tribes in the north that were led by the men of Ephraim, Joseph's younger son.

According to the etymology presented in Genesis 32:28, Israel is derived from the Hebrew verb sarah, which means "he struggled," hence the meaning "he struggles or he will struggle with God" (cf. Hos 12:3). Some have challenged this etymology but this evidence derived from the text is the best explanation that we have.

The oldest reference to Israel outside of the Bible is in the Merneptah Stele (ca. 1225 BC), which attests to Israel's presence in the land of Canaan as early as the 13th century. Another important extra-biblical text that makes mention of Israel is the Moabite Stone also known as King Mesha's Stele), which dates back to the 9th century BC and was discovered in Dibon, east of the Dead Sea. Its text contains references to King Omri of Israel and to the territory that was disputed by the leaders of Israel and Moab.

Israel's history begins with the patriarchal stories in Genesis, and continues through the rest of the Pentateuch, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, Samuel, and Kings. It ends with the destruction of the southern kingdom of Judah and the exile to Babylon. A complimentary account is found in Chronicles that focuses on David's rise to power and the building of the temple. It ends with the decree by Cyrus and the post-exilic reforms of Ezra and Nehemiah.

Patriarch Jacob. Like his twin brother Esau (also called Edom), Jacob had

another name, Israel, which was given to him after his experience at Penniel (Exod 32:30). At his birth, he was given the name Jacob because he "grasped his brother's heel." This new name Israel was a constant reminder of his life changing encounter with God in which Jacob learned to hold fast to God. Later on the Bible, this experience is referred to as "the time of Jacob's trouble" (Jer 30:7). While Abraham is the father of all the worshipers of the one true God, his grandson Jacob is the father of the children of Israel who descended from Jacob's sons, later on the nation's twelve tribes were named after these twelve sons (Gen 49:28). The people of Israel and their nation were named for their patronymic ancestor Jacob or Israel (Gen 25-49). The two names are used interchangeably throughout the Bible (Gen 46:5; Isa 44:1).

On his deathbed, Jacob gave the blessings of the firstborn son to Joseph even though Reuben was the eldest. In the end, Judah became the governing tribe (Ps 78:67-72) from which King David was born and later Jesus Christ. In the Bible, Jacob's family was for the first time referred to as "a people" during their stay in Egypt (Exod 1:9). In the book of Exodus, the name Israel is repeatedly used for the people of Israel, like in Exodus 3 where God says "Israel is my son, my firstborn . . ."

The Wilderness Period. Over a period of ten generations, Jacob's family of

seventy-two persons increased to a nation of six hundred thousand men ready to go to a battle (Num 1:46). But Israel was enslaved in the land of Egypt in the region of the Nile delta. God remembered His promises to Abraham and called Moses to lead the people from slavery to freedom. After a series of ten plagues, the king of Egypt let Israel go, though he once more tried to stop them by the Red Sea. But God intervened and the Pharaoh's army perished in the sea.

At Mount Sinai, God reaffirmed His covenant with the patriarchs and promised to make Israel His treasured possession, a kingdom of priests and a holy nation (Exod 19:5-6). In return, Israel was asked to love their God and serve Him only (Deut 6-11). An important visible sign of God's covenant with the people of Israel as a nation was the sanctuary built by Moses in the wilderness of Sinai. This structure was also known as the Tent of Meeting or the Tabernacle (Exod 35-40) because it marked the place of meeting of the people among themselves and also with their God.

The Conquest of the Land. After the death of Moses, his successor Joshua led the

people through the Jordan river into the land of Canaan, the promised land of Israel. The conquest was gradual and some parts of the land never came under the full control of the Israelites. The occupied territory was divided among the twelve tribes.

After the death of Joshua, Israel was ruled by charismatic military leaders called the judges. The best-known judges of Israel were Samson, Deborah and Barak, and Gideon. Samuel the prophet was the last judge and also a priest. He was privileged to anoint Israel's first two kings.

The United Monarchy. The first king anointed to lead the tribes of Israel was Saul from the tribe of Benjamin. Saul chose Gibeah to be his residence and from there his army fought valiantly against Israel's enemies on every side, especially the Amalekites and the Philistines.

After the death of Saul and his son Jonathan in the battle of Gilboa, David became king of the twelve tribes of Israel, which he unified into one strong kingdom. David reigned first in Hebron; then he conquered Jerusalem and made it the capital city. He fought many wars and brought peace to Israel on all sides. David's son Solomon built Jerusalem's first temple to the LORD, which became the center of worship for all Israel. During the reign of David and Solomon, the land of Israel extended from Dan in the north to the southern town of Beersheba.

The Divided Kingdom. After the death of its third king Solomon, Israel's united

monarchy collapsed and the nation split into two separate entities. The ten tribes from the north kept the name Israel (the Northern Kingdom of Israel), while the two in the south formed the (Southern) Kingdom of Judah. The northern kingdom had advantages of size, fertility of land, and better opportunities for foreign trade. The southern kingdom had advantages of David's dynastic succession, the presence of the temple, and the promises of the future Redeemer.

The first king in the north, Jeroboam I, established a new religion by blending the worship of Yahweh with the calf worship of Egypt. He did this in hope of diverting the affections of his people from the temple in Jerusalem and David's dynasty. Later on, the worship of Baal (Hadad) was openly promoted by the leaders in the north, especially by Ahab's wife Jezebel, daughter of the king of Tyre. Jehu worked hard to eradicate this practice. During this period, the people of both kingdoms joined together to worship and celebrate their sacred feasts in Jerusalem only on rare occasions.

Most of the biblical prophets never accepted the division of Israel. Some prophets used the term Israel interchangeably for both kingdoms (Isa 8:14), while on occasion they referred to the kingdom of Judah as Israel (Isa 5:7; Jer 10:1; Dan 9:11, 20; cf. Ezra 2:2). Hosea looked forward to the day when the people of Judah and the people of Israel would be reunited, and would appoint one leader (Hos 1:11), who was identified as David (Hos 3:5).

Samaria, the capital in the north, was destroyed by the Assyrians in 722 BC and its population was deported and scattered in faraway lands. Jerusalem, the capital of the southern kingdom, and its temple were both destroyed in 586 BC with many captives taken to Babylonia. Even in exile, the prophet Ezekiel used the term Israel to refer to the kingdom of Judah (Ezek 3:1, 7). Although the nation's two kingdoms came to an end, God had prepared a faithful remnant that would become the heirs to the blessings and promises given long ago. Most importantly the promised Messiah would come from this small remnant to save His people.

Between the Testaments. Intertestamental texts known as the Apocrypha and

Pseudepigrapha use "Israel" in ways similar to the OT, though their definite emphasis is on the nation of Judah. The sectarians at Qumran called themselves Israel to show that they were God's people and as such the legitimate continuation of the promises given in the OT that include the teaching about the two messiahs, one royal and one priestly.

The NT. The name Israel is applied by NT writers to people of Jewish descent (John

3:10; Acts 2:22). Matthew, in the beginning of his gospel, portrays Jesus as fulfilling the promise of the coming "Ruler who will shepherd My people Israel" (cf. Mic 5:2). Thus, Christ is the new Israel who accomplishes God's will in all the aspects in which old Israel had failed. Matthew applies to Jesus the OT saying that God called his son out of Egypt (Hos 11:1). In Acts 2, Peter and John addressed the crowd of worshippers at the temple in Jerusalem as "men of Israel" or "house of Israel." Paul did the same in Acts 13:16. When writing His letter to the early believers, James, the brother of Jesus, addressed it to "the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad" (Jas 1:1).

Paul uses the term "Israel" to refer to the people of the Abrahamic covenant, but he emphasizes the spiritual nature of Israel especially in the Messianic and eschatological time periods. God did not reject His people (Rom 11:1) even though the leaders of Israel rejected God's Anointed. The stubbornness of some who belonged to Israel in flesh worked for the benefit of the believing Gentiles who now share the blessings of God's covenant people promised to Abraham (Gen 12:3). Thus, the believing Gentiles are now part of "the Israel of God" (Gal 6:16). We have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem (Heb 12:22). John the Revelator saw in New Jerusalem twelve gates and "names written on them, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel" (Rev 21:12).

See also Restoration of Israel.