Twelve Tribes of Israel
The Twelve Tribes of Israel(12 tribes is a misnomer. There were actually 13 listed in the Bible, since there were two tribes from Joseph, and 1 for each of the other 11 sons of Jacob)(
Skepticism of the account given in the Torah, or Old Testament, is not new. Many Scholars, such as Francis William Newman, did not believe that the description of the Hittites in the Bible was historical, and the existence of the Hittite civilization was doubted until evidence for it was identified at the end of the 19th century.Biblical narrative
Tribes of Israel |
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Genealogy
Jacob, later called Israel, was the second-born son of Isaac and Rebecca, the younger twin brother of Esau, and the grandson of Abraham and Sarah. According to biblical texts, he was chosen by God to be the patriarch of the Israelite nation. From what is known of Jacob, he had two wives, sisters Leah and Rachel, and two concubines, Bilhah and Zilpah, by whom he had thirteen children. The twelve sons form the basis for the twelve tribes of Israel, listed in the order from oldest to youngest: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun, Joseph, and Benjamin. Jacob was known to display favoritism among his children, particularly for Joseph and Benjamin, the sons of his favorite wife, Rachel, and so the tribes themselves were not treated equally in a divine sense. Joseph, despite being the second-youngest son, received double the inheritance of his brothers, treated as if he were the firstborn son instead of Reuben, and so his tribe was later split into two tribes, named after his sons, Ephraim and Manasseh.[3]
Sons and tribes
The
- The sons of Leah; Reuben (Jacob's firstborn), Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun
- The sons of Rachel; Joseph and Benjamin (Jacob's last)
- The sons of Bilhah, Rachel's handmaid; Dan and Naphtali
- The sons of Zilpah, Leah's handmaid; Gad and Asher
Deuteronomy 27:12–13 lists the twelve tribes:
- Reuben (Hebrew רְאוּבֵן Rəʼūḇēn)
- Simeon (שִׁמְעוֹן Šīməʻōn)
- Levi (לֵוִי Lēwī)
- Judah (יְהוּדָה Yəhūdā)
- Issachar (יִשָּׂשכָר Yīssāḵār)
- Zebulun (זְבוּלֻן Zəḇūlun)
- Dan (דָּן Dān)
- Naphtali (נַפְתָּלִי Nap̄tālī)
- Gad (גָּד Gāḏ)
- Asher (אָשֵׁר ’Āšēr)
- Benjamin (בִּנְיָמִן Bīnyāmīn)
- Joseph (יוֹסֵף Yōsēp̄), later split into two "half-tribes":
Jacob elevated the descendants of
In the biblical narrative the period from the
Living in exile in the sixth century BCE, the prophet Ezekiel has a vision for the restoration of Israel,[17] of a future in which the twelve tribes of Israel are living in their land again.[18]
Land allotment
According to Joshua 13–19, the Land of Israel was divided into twelve sections corresponding to the twelve tribes of Israel. However, the tribes receiving land differed from the biblical tribes. The Tribe of Levi had no land appropriation but had six Cities of Refuge under their administration as well as the Temple in Jerusalem. There was no land allotment for the Tribe of Joseph, but Joseph's two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, received their father's land portion.[19][20]
Thus the tribes receiving an allotment were:[21]
Descendants
- The Tribe of Reuben: Reuben was a member of the Northern Kingdom of Israel until the kingdom was conquered by Assyria. According to 1 Chronicles 5:26, Tiglath-Pileser III of Assyria (ruled 745–727 BC) deported the Reubenites, Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh to "Halah, Habor, Hara, and the Gozan River." According to the Moabite Mesha Stele (ca. 840 BCE) the Moabites reclaimed many territories in the second part of the 9th century BCE (only recently conquered by Omri and Ahab according to the Stele). The stele does mention fighting against the tribe of Gad but not the tribe of Reuben, even though taking Nebo and Jahaz which were in the centre in their designated homeland. This would suggest that the tribe of Reuben at this time was no longer recognizable as a separate force in this area. Even if still present at the outbreak of this war, the outcome of this war would have left them without a territory of their own, just like the tribes of Simeon and Levi. This is, according to Richard Elliot Friedman in Who Wrote the Bible?, the reason why these three tribes are passed over in favour of Judah in the J-version of Jacob's deathbed blessing (composed in Judah before the fall of Israel).
- The Tribe of Simeon: An Babylonians to the Kingdom of Aksum (in what is now Ethiopia), to a place behind the dark mountains.[22]
- The Tribe of Ephraim: As part of the Mizo Jews, whom the modern state of Israel regards as descendants of Manasseh.[23]
- The Tribe of Issachar: R' David Kimchi (ReDaK) to I Chronicles 9:1 expounds that there remained from the tribes of Ephraim, Manasseh, Issachar and Zebulun in the territory of Judah after the exile of the ten tribes. This remnant returned with the tribe of Judah after the Babylonian Exile.[24]
- The Tribe of Judah: returned to their original land along with what remained from the tribes of Ephraim, Manasseh, Issachar, and Zebulun that had not been exiled elsewhere, after the Babylonian Exile.[25]
- The Tribe of Zebulun: As part of the their further history being lost. Israeli Knesset member Ayoob Kara speculated that the Druze are descended from one of the Lost Tribes of Israel, probably Zevulun. Kara stated that the Druze share many of the same beliefs as Jews, and that he has genetic evidence to prove that the Druze were descended from Jews.[26]
- The Tribes of Dan; Gad; Asher and Naphtali: First Temple. As noted above the Tribe of Simeon was also deported to the Kingdom of Aksum (in what is now Ethiopia).
- The Tribe of Manasseh: Part of the Samaritansclaim that some of their adherents are descended from this tribe.
- The Tribe of Benjamin apparently became part of the Tribe of Judah.
In Christianity
The twelve tribes of Israel are referred to in the
The Book of Revelation (7:1–8) gives a list of the twelve tribes. However, the Tribe of Dan is omitted while Joseph is mentioned alongside Manasseh. In the vision of the Heavenly Jerusalem, the tribes' names (the names of the twelve sons of Jacob) are written on the city gates (Ezekiel 48:30–35 & Revelation 21:12–13).
In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a patriarchal blessing usually contains a declaration of the lineage of the recipient of blessing in relation to the twelve tribes of Israel.[29]
In Islam
The Quran (7th century CE) states that the people of Moses were split into twelve tribes. Surah 7 (Al-A'raf) verse 160 says:
"We split them up into twelve tribal communities, and We revealed to Moses, when his people asked him for water, [saying], ‘Strike the rock with your cane,’ whereat twelve fountains gushed forth from it. Every tribe came to know its drinking-place. And We shaded them with clouds, and We sent down to them manna and quails: ‘Eat of the good things We have provided you.’ And they did not wrong Us, but they used to wrong [only] themselves."[30]
Historicity
Scholarly examination
For thousands of years, Christians and Jews have accepted the history of the twelve tribes as fact. Since the 19th century, however, historical criticism has examined the veracity of the historical account; whether the twelve tribes ever existed as they are described, the historicity of the eponymous ancestors, and even whether the earliest version of this tradition assumes the existence of twelve tribes.[31]
Biblical lists of tribes, not all of which number 12, include the following:
- The Blessing of Jacob (Genesis 49) directly mentions Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Zebulun, Issachar, Dan, Gad, Asher, Naphtali, Joseph, and Benjamin and especially extolls Joseph over his brothers.
- Blessing of Moses (Deuteronomy 33) mentions Benjamin, Joseph, Zebulun, Issachar, Gad, Dan, Naphtali, Asher, Reuben, Levi, and Judah, omitting Simeon.
- Kenites, two Judahite clans.[citation needed] Ephraim and Manasseh(The two tribes of Joseph), Zebulun, Asher, Naphtali and Dan are mentioned, but Issachar, Reuben, Gad,(Rueben and Gad were given land east of the Jordan, which they returned to in Joshua 22) and Levi (Levi did not partake in the conquest and was spared out across the tribes) are not.[32][1]
- the Song of Deborah (Judges 5:2–31), widely acknowledged as one of the oldest passages in the Bible, mentions eight of the tribes: Ephraim, Benjamin, Zebulun, Issachar, Reuben, Dan, Asher, and Naphtali. The people of the Gilead region, and Machir, a subsection of Manasseh, are also mentioned. The other five tribes (Simeon, Levi, Judah, Gad, and Joseph) are not mentioned.[33]
- The Rechabites and the Jerahmeelites are also presented as Israelite tribes elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible, but never feature in any list of tribes of Israel.[1]
Theories of origin
Scholars such as
Biblical scholar
Translator Paul Davidson argued:[35] "The stories of Jacob and his children, then, are not accounts of historical Bronze Age people. Rather, they tell us how much later Jews and Israelites understood themselves, their origins, and their relationship to the land, within the context of folktales that had evolved over time." He goes on to argue that most of the tribal names are "not personal names, but the names of ethnic groups, geographical regions, and local deities. E.g. Benjamin, meaning "son of the south" (the location of its territory relative to Samaria), or Asher, a Phoenician territory whose name may be an allusion to the goddess Asherah."[32]
Historian Immanuel Lewy
Norman Gottwald argued that the division into twelve tribes originated as an administrative scheme under King David.[39][40]
Additionally, the
Levite Y-chromosome studies
Recent studies of genetic markers within Jewish populations strongly suggest that modern Ashkenazi
Attributed coats of arms
Attributed arms are Western European coats of arms given retrospectively to persons real or fictitious who died before the start of the age of heraldry in the latter half of the 12th century.[citation needed]
Attributed arms of the Twelve Tribes from the Portuguese Thesouro de Nobreza , 1675
-
Asher
-
Benjamin
-
Dan
-
Ephraim
-
Gad
-
Issachar
-
Judah
-
Manasseh
-
Naphtali
-
Reuben
-
Simeon
-
Zebulun
See also
- Black Judaism
- Israel (the modern state, founded in 1948 CE)
- Kingdom of Israel (the northern kingdom, according to scriptural accounts, it existed from 930 to 722 BCE)
- Kingdom of Judah (the southern kingdom, according to scriptural accounts, it existed from 930 to 586 BCE)
- List of Jewish states and dynasties
- Ten Lost Tribes
References
- ^ ISBN 978-3-319-51695-0. Retrieved 25 May 2021.
- ISBN 978-0-88414-451-9.
- ^ "The King James Bible" – via Wikisource.
- ^ Genesis 35:23–26
- ^ Genesis 41:50
- ^ Genesis 35:22; 1 Chronicles 5:1,2; Genesis 48:5
- ^ ISBN 978-0-664-22265-9.
- ISBN 978-1-4422-0518-5.
- ^ "Besides the rejection of the Albrightian ‘conquest' model, the general consensus among OT scholars is that the Book of Joshua has no value in the historical reconstruction. They see the book as an ideological retrojection from a later period — either as early as the reign of Josiah or as late as the Hasmonean period."
K. Lawson Younger Jr. (1 October 2004). "Early Israel in Recent Biblical Scholarship". In David W. Baker; Bill T. Arnold (eds.). The Face of Old Testament Studies: A Survey of Contemporary Approaches. Baker Academic. p. 200. ISBN 978-0-8010-2871-7.
- ISBN 90-04-11554-4.
- ISBN 978-0-19-939387-9.
- ISBN 978-1-58983-912-0.
- ISBN 978-0-8042-3107-7.
- ISBN 978-1-134-94215-2.
- ISBN 978-1-58983-066-0.
- ISBN 978-1-317-49031-9.
- ^ Ezekiel 47:13
- ISBN 978-0-567-03054-2.
- ^ Genesis 48:5
- ^ Joshua 14:14
- ^ "The Twelve Tribes of Israel". www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org.
- ^ "Simeon, Tribe of" (Jewish Encyclopedia 1906)
- ^ a b ‘Lost tribe of Israel’ found in southern India, Canadian Jewish News, 7 October 2010
- ^ The Tribe of Issachar
- ^ The Tribe of Issachar
- ^ Lev, David (25 October 2010). "MK Kara: Druze are Descended from Jews". Israel National News. Arutz Sheva. Retrieved 13 April 2011.
- ISBN 978-0-275-97000-0. p. 2
- ^ "India: Lost tribe of Menashe celebrates Sukkot". Israel365 News | Latest News. Biblical Perspective. September 20, 2021.
- ^ "Patriarchal Blessings". Gospel Topics. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Retrieved 9 February 2022.
- ^ al-quran.info/#7:160/1
- ^ "Did Israel Always Have Twelve Tribes?". www.thetorah.com.
- ^ a b D, Paul (July 9, 2014). "The Twelve (or So) Tribes of Israel".
- JSTOR 1518497– via JSTOR.
- ^ Peake's commentary on the Bible (1962) by Matthew Black, Harold Henry Rowley, and Arthur Samuel Peake - Thomas Nelson (publisher)
- ^ "Is the NIV a deliberate mistranslation? | Psephizo". July 16, 2015.
- ^ "The Birth of the Bible, by Immanuel Lewy". July 1, 1951.
- ^ "Immanuel Lewy b. 19 Sep 1884 Berlin, Germany d. 2 Feb 1970 New York, NY, USA: Blank Family". blankgenealogy.com.
- ^ "The Study of Man: Archaeology and the Bible's Historical Truth". Commentary Magazine. May 1, 1954.
- ISBN 9781841270265– via Google Books.
- S2CID 167013727.
- ^ "The Tribe of Gad and The Mesha Stele – TheTorah.com". www.thetorah.com.
- ^ "Newly deciphered Moabite inscription may be first use of written word 'Hebrews'". Times of Israel.
- ^ PMID 29097670.