Israelites

corresponds to the Hebrew appellation "children of Israel", a name by which --

together with the simple form "Israel" -- the chosen people usually called

themselves in Old-Testament times. Foreigners and Israelites speaking of

themselves to foreigners used the term "Hebrews", commonly explained as

denoting those who have come from "the other side" of the river (the Euphrates).

Another synonym for Israelites is the term Jews (Ioudaioi), especially used by

classical authors, but also often found in Josephus and in the New-Testament

writings. The object of the present article is distinctly geographical and

ethnographical, leaving, as far as possible, the other topics connected with the

Israelites to be dealt with in the article on JEWS AND JUDAISM, or in particular

articles on the leading personages or events in Israel's history.

SEMITIC RELATIONSHIP

The Israelites belong to the group of ancient peoples who are designated under

the general name of Semites, and whose countries extended from the

Mediterranean Sea to the other side of the Euphrates and Tigris, and from the

mountains of Armenia to the southern coast of Arabia. According to the Biblical

classification of the descendants of Noe (Gen., x), it is clear that the semitic

group included the Arabs, Babylonians, Assyrians, Arameans, and Hebrews, to

which peoples modern ethnographers add, chiefly on linguistic grounds, the

Phoenicians and Chanaaneans. It thus appears that the Israelites of old claimed

actual kinship with some of the most powerful nations of the East, although the

nearness or remoteness of this kinship cannot be determined at the present day.

As might be expected, their ethnic relation to the Semitic tribes who, together

with the Israelites, make up the sub-group of the Terabites, is more definitely

known. The closeness of this relationship can easily be seen by means of the

following table, the data of which are supplied by the earliest source embodied in

the Book of Genesis:

____Aran___________Lot

|

|

| __Ismael ___Esau (Edom)

Thare____|____Abraham_____| |

| |__Isaac_____________|

| | |___Jacob (Israel)

| |__Madian et al.

|____Nachor

This table plainly shows that the Moabites, the Ammonites, the Edomites, and

the Israelites were tribes of kindred origin, a fact which is readily acknowledged

by contemporary scholars. It shows no less plainly that the children of Israel

were also conscious of a close relationship with both the Arameans (Syrians) to

the north-east and the Sinaitic nomads to the south of Palestine; and there is no

doubt that, despite the rejection of Israel's kinship with Aram by some recent

critics, both the Aramean and the Arabian relationships of Israel should be

admitted. In the abstract, these relationships are not exclusive of each other, for

there is no reason to suppose that ancient Israel was more homogeneous than

any other migratory and conquering people; and in the concrete, both the

relationships in question are equally borne witness to in the earliest historical

records (cf. Gen., xxiv, 4, 10; xxvii, 43; xxix, 4, etc., in favour of Israel's

relationship with Aram).

EARLY MIGRATION

The history of the Israelites begins with the migration of the kindred tribes

mentioned in the above table, in the person of their ancestor, Thare, from

Babylonia. The starting-point of this memorable migration was, according to

Gen., xi, 28, 31, "Ur of the Chaldees ", which has recently been identified with

Mugheir (Muqayyar; Accadian Uriwa, an important city in ancient days, some six

miles (distant from the right bank of the Euphrates, and about 125 miles

north-west of the Persian Gulf. Its actual goal, according to Gen., xi, 31, was

"the land of Chanaan". The movement thus generally described is in distinct

harmony with the well-ascertained fact that at an early date Babylonian

enterprise had penetrated to Palestine and thereby opened up to the Semitic

element of Chaldea a track towards the region which at the present day is often

regarded as the original centre of the dispersion of the Semites, viz. Northern

Arabia. The course taken was by way of Haran (in Aram), a city some 600 miles

north-west of Ur, and its rival in the worship of the Moon-god, Sin. Not in worship

alone, but also in culture, laws, and customs, Haran closely resembled Ur, and

the call of Abraham -- God's command bidding him to seek a new country (Gen.,

xii, l) -- was doubtless welcome to one whose purer conception of the Deity

made him dissatisfied with his heathen surroundings (cf. Jos., xxiv, 2 sq.). There

is also reason to think that at this time Northern Babylonia was greatly disturbed

by invading Kassites, a mountain race related to the Elamites. While, then,

Thare's second son, Nachor, remained in Haran, where he originated the Aramaic

settlement, Abraham and Lot went forth, passed Damascus, and reached the

goal of their journey. The settlements which Holy Writ connects with Abraham

and Lot need only to be mentioned here. The tribes directly related to Lot were

those of Moab and Ammon, of which the former established itself east of the

Dead Sea, and the latter settled on the eastern side of the Amorrhite kingdom

which extended between the Arnom and the Jeboc. Of the tribes more

immediately related to Abraham, the Ismaelites and the Madianites seem to have

lived in the Peninsula of Sinai; the Edornites took possession of Mount Seir, the

hilly tract of land lying south of the Dead Sea and east of the Arabah; and the

Israelites settled in the country west of the Jordan, the districts with which they

are more particularly connected in the Book of Genesis being those of Sichem,

Bethel, Hebron, and Bersabee. The history of the Israelites in these early times

is chiefly associated with the Patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Israel), all

of whom kept a distinct remembrance of their close kinship with the Semitic

settlement in Aram (cf. Gen., xxiv; xxviii), and the first of whom appears to have

reached Chanaan about 2300 B.C., when he came into passing contact with

Egypt (Gen., xii) and Elam (Gen., xiv) (see BABYLONIA).

III. SOJOURN IN EGYPT

The intercourse of Abraham with Egypt, just referred to, gave place eventually to

one of much longer duration on the part of his descendants, when the Israelites

went down to Egypt under the pressure of famine, and settled peaceably in the

district of Gessen, east of the Delta. The fact of this later migration of Israel fits in

well with the general data afforded by Egyptian history. About 2100B.C. Lower

Egypt had been invaded and conquered by a body of Asiatics, probably of

Semitic origin, called the Hyksos, who established themselves at Zoan (Tanis), a

city in the Delta, about 35 miles north of Gessen. Their rule, to which the

fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth dynasties are assigned, lasted 511 years,

according to Manetho (cf. Josephus, "Contra Ap.", I, xiv). It was of course

repulsive to the native princes, whose authority was restricted to Thebes, while it

proved attractive to other invading bodies, Asiatic like the Hyksos themselves.

Among these later arrivals are naturally reckoned the Israelites, who probably

entered Egypt sometime prior to 1600 B.C., the date assigned for the eventual

expulsion of the Hyksos by the Egyptian native kings. The position of Gessen

has been fixed by recent excavations, and, as the Israelites were left to pursue

without molestation their pastoral life in that region, they rapidly increased in

numbers and wealth. The history of Israel's settlement in Egypt is connected

particularly with Joseph, Jacob's beloved son by Rachel.