The Name of Israel
The etymology of the name Israel is given in Gen. 32:28 as “one who strives with God.” The same passage indicates that it was first a personal name, the name given to Jacob, the younger of the twin sons of Isaac, as a description of his character and personal achievement. Later the name would be used to refer to the whole Jewish nation who descended from Israel. During its early days, the Israelites were often still called by their longer title “The children of Israel.” This usage continued through the exodus period and later, ultimately yielding to the simpler form which identifies Israel as a nation after the exodus. So long as the nation remained a unity, the name was the symbol both of its common life and of Its distinctive religious character and mission conformably to its original meaning.
Outline of the Biblical History of Israel
Genesis: The origins of Israel
Exodus to Deuteronomy: The establishment of the theocracy,
Joshua: The conquest of Canaan
Judges: Life under the theocracy
Books of Samuel: The establishment and development of the monarchy
Books of Kings: History of Israel and Judah and their downfall
Books of Chronicles: History of Judah and its downfall
Ezra and Nehemiah: The return from exile
The History of Israel
The Conquest of Canaan
During its development, Israel passed through three stages of growth. During the first stage, which started with the exodus and ended with the conquest of Canaan, Israel was a rather loosely bound federation of clans held together by a certain sense of kinship among its members, bond by the exceptionally strong leadership of Moses and Joshua for nearly a century, and by the possession of the same general religious experience. Acting together in this federation, Israel not only became more closely knit as a unit but achieved the conquest of the land that was to be its permanent home.
The Theocracy
During the second stage, the period of Judges, the leadership of outstanding men was missing. But the community of religious faith continued, although under severe strain and frequent lapses. This was a period of struggle for separate existence and independence. It was characterized by wars with the surrounding nations, including the Midianites, Amalekites, and especially the Philistines. As a whole, the experience pushed Israel to desire more governmental organization. Which eventually led to the establishment of the monarchy under Saul.
The United Monarchy
The third stage of the history is that of the United Kingdom under Saul, David, and Solomon. Out of these three, the first was the liberator of Israel. He freed the people from the Philistine yoke. But he did not contribute materially to the consolidation of the tribes into a nation. Although David, after many years of patient and tactful work, achieved this result. At the same time, he centralized the religious worship by moving the ark to Jerusalem and making that city the capital of the kingdom. Solomon carried the external unity and prosperity of Israel to the most extreme limit ever reached. He embellished and fortified the land with many structural enterprises, including the great Temple in Jerusalem and created an international commerce for the nation as a whole. But his policy involved large burdens of taxation and other factors that caused discontentment among the people. After his death, ten of the twelve tribes of Israel sent representatives to his son and successor, Rehoboam, asking him to change his father’s policies. The fact that they did so itself is proof that Israel had never been completely unified. There is other evidence of this, for instance, the temporary division between Judah and the other tribes, which occurred after the death of Saul that lasted for seven years until it was healed by the election of David as the new king. (II Sa. 3:1; 5:1). In the end, Rehoboam did not grant to their request, all but the tribes of Judah and Benjamin seceded from the union and organized a kingdom of their own.
The Divided Kingdom
The name “Israel” then was passed to the new kingdom of the Ten Tribes while Judah and Benjamin became known as just the kingdom of Judah. The capital of Israel’s government was established at Samaria, near the old Shechem, while Jerusalem remained the capital of the other kingdom. Israel developed some new features of national life, the main one being the adoption of the bull of Jeroboam’s calf cult as the emblem of God and the erection of two shrines, one in the northern extremity of the land, at Dan, and the other at the southern end, at Bethel, near the borders of Judah, where Jehovah could be worshipped under the image of the bull.
For twenty-one years, 931-910 B. C, Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, reigned over Israel. His son Nadab was displaced by Baasha, who, together with his son Elah, reigned for twenty-three years, constituting the second dynasty. After a very short rule by Zimri, in 891. Omri came to the throne and founded his dynasty. Omri’s son Ahab (who became famous because of his interactions with Elijah the prophet, his alliance with Jehoshaphat and his conflicts with Benhadad) Omri’s two grandsons Ahaziah and Joram held the kingdom until the year 842 when Jehu overthrew his dynasty, and established one of his own which proved to be the longest-living of them all. His reign lasted twenty-eight years, his son Jehoahaz’s seventeen, his grandson Joash’s sixteen, and his great-grandson Jeroboam II’s forty-one, making a total length of one hundred and two years for his dynasty, not including the year or less that Zechariah, the last of the dynasty ruled. These longer dynasties were followed by four others that together combine into fifty years. These followed each other in quick succession. Shallum, who supplanted the dynasty of Jehu, was followed by Menahem within a few months. Menahem reigned nine years and was succeeded by his son Pekahiah after two years. Pekahiah was displaced by Pekah, and when he had reigned twenty-nine years, Hoshea, the last of the kings of Israel, gained the throne.
The Exile
It was during Hoshea’s reign that the repeated invasions of the Assyrians reached their climax. In Shalmaneser’s final siege of Samaria. Shalmaneser did not finish the conquest since he was called back to Damascus due to a revolt in Syria. But his successor, Sargon, returned to see the siege of Samaria. Where they sacked the city and carried most of the residents of the country captive to Assyria, replacing them with colonists from Assyria. These colonists then mixed with the Israelites who were left behind and as Israel disappeared as an organized nation.
Return from Exile
After the collapse of the Northern Kingdom, for a century, the name “Israel” fell into disuse, the Northern Kingdom continued to be called “Judah.” The prophets of the period, however, never lost sight of their promised Israel, which was a restored and united nation, consisting of all the Twelve Tribes. So Jeremiah (3:11, 12; 31:31), Zephaniah (3:14, 15) and Micah (3:8) use the name Israel in reference to the nation. After the Exile and the restoration of the Jewish state, the name “Israel” was retaken by Judah, the one surviving branch of the divided kingdom (Ezra 6:16; Neh. 11:3). By the time of the New Testament, the Jews as a nation, taken collectively and with a view to their peculiar relation to God, are uniformly called “Israel” (Mat. 9:33; Lu. 2:32; Jno. 3:10; Acts 4:11). However, when speaking about them as a people in relation to other nations such as the Romans, Greeks or Persians, they were still designated as “the Jews.”
Extra-Biblical References to Early Israel
Israel is mentioned as a nation composed of all the descendants of Jacob in the Israel Stele of the Egyptian king Merenptah, the El Amarna Letters, and on the Moabite Stone.