Now YHWH said unto Abram: 'Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto the land that I will show thee. And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and be thou a blessing. And I will bless them that bless thee, and him that curseth thee will I curse; and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed.' So Abram went, as YHWH had spoken unto him; and Lot went with him; and Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran. Genesis 12:1-4
And they took Lot, Abram's brother's son, who dwelt in Sodom, and his goods, and departed. And there came one that had escaped and told Abram the Hebrew--now he dwelt by the terebinths of Mamre the Amorite, brother of Eshcol, and brother of Aner; and these were confederate with Abram. Genesis 14:12-13
I recently posted the following simple equations on Facebook, preceded by the statement In the Bible:
Ephraim = Israel Jew = Judah
A couple of commenters felt I was in error and spreading “false doctrine”. I explained that the name Israel is the heritage of the sons of Joseph, and Ephraim was chosen as the first-born, and posted a couple of scriptures:
They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead them; I will cause them to walk by rivers of waters, in a straight way wherein they shall not stumble; for I am become a father to Israel, and Ephraim is My first-born. Jeremiah 31:8
And He will set up an ensign for the nations, and will assemble the dispersed of Israel, and gather together the scattered of Judah from the four corners of the earth. The envy also of Ephraim shall depart, and they that harass Judah shall be cut off; Ephraim shall not envy Judah, and Judah shall not vex Ephraim. Isaiah 11:12,13
There was a certain Jew in Shushan the castle, whose name was Mordecai the son of Jair the son of Shimei the son of Kish, a Benjamite, who had been carried away from Jerusalem with the captives that had been carried away with Jeconiah king of Judah, whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried away. Esther 2:5,6
The first two from Jeremiah and Isaiah show that “Ephraim” is very often synonymous with “Israel” in the Bible. The book of Esther is the first one where the term “Jew” is used, and it refers to a Benjamite, Mordecai, who was of those taken captive with the king of Judah, which indicates that the Benjamite was considered a Jew because he lived in the kingdom of Judah, not because he was a Judahite by birth.
And he said to Jeroboam: 'Take thee ten pieces; for thus saith YHWH, the God of Israel: Behold, I will rend the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon and will give ten tribes to thee-- but I will take the kingdom out of his son's hand, and will give it unto thee, even ten tribes. And unto his son will I give one tribe, that David My servant may have a lamp always before Me in Jerusalem, the city which I have chosen Me to put My name there. And I will take thee, and thou shalt reign over all that thy soul desireth, and shalt be king over Israel. 1 Kings 11:31,35-37
The one tribe that was left to the son of Solomon was Benjamin, within whose territory Jerusalem was located, thus making the inhabitants of Benjamin subjects of the king of Judah or Judahites, who would later be known as Jews. Jeroboam, who was made king of Israel by the God of Israel, was an Ephraimite of the house of Joseph, again showing the link between Ephraim and Israel.
This is all pretty straight forward when you accept the scriptures as they are written: there is a clear distinction between Judah and Ephraim/Joseph, and the name Israel is often directly linked to the family of Joseph. There is no ambiguity, yet the vast majority of people today don’t know this, and those who do often choose to ignore this truth. The religious Jews know it:
You sometimes hear people saying things like “The Jews are God’s chosen people”, as though the Bible actually says this when it is nowhere written in scripture! The Prime Minister of Israel speaks as though the entire Bible is about the “Jewish” people, when nothing could be further from the truth; the name Judah has never stood for the entire family of Jacob. Truth is what can be proven: I read an article once by a Jewish Rabbi— Rabbi Shlomo Riskin of Efrat— in which he stated that the Jewish holiday, Rosh Hashanah, is in the Bible. I acquired his email address and wrote him to ask where in the Bible it is located, but I never received a reply. I also wrote Chabad, the Hassidic Jewish organization with the same question, and, again, received no answer, although they send me all sorts of promotional information!
If it’s in the Bible, the scripture can be quoted as proof: I deliberately didn’t use Abraham in the title of this article because the truth is the scriptures don’t say that God chose “Abraham”; He actually chose “Abram”, and later changed his name to “Abraham”! Some will say that I’m being pedantic, but that’s not the case; it is not being pedantic to insist on accuracy and truth.
At about the time of the end a body of men will be raised up at Jerusalem/Israel, the holy promised land, and turn their attention to the scriptures and demand their literal interpretation (in the midst of much clamor and opposition). Sir Isaac Newton - 1672
My teacher, Prince Shaleak Ben Yehudah, made me aware of this quote around 1975. I subsequently used part of it as the title of my book published in 2013, At About the Time of the End. When I was researching for the book in 2011-12, I had no problems finding this quote on Google, today it is almost impossible to locate and even information about Sir Isaac Newton has been restricted. My teacher, Rabbi Ben Ammi, said that truth/the word of God is the major destabilizer today and we see all kinds of efforts being made to keep people from simple truth. He said truth is our major weapon in this spiritual battle, but the thing we must remember about truth is that it is no respecter of persons— it cuts both coming and going— and no one has a monopoly on it!
Rabbi Ben Ammi said we arrived here as Israelites, direct descendants of the Biblical Israelites.
The Prime Minister of Israel says the Jewish people have been connected to the land 3,500 years, and the first 2,000 are found in the Bible. He said he wanted to go back to the first Moses, the Moses of the Bible, so what did that Moses say in the Bible?
And afterward Moses and Aaron came, and said unto Pharaoh: 'Thus saith YHWH, the God of Israel: Let My people go, that they may hold a feast unto Me in the wilderness.' And Pharaoh said: 'Who is YHWH, that I should hearken unto His voice to let Israel go? I know not YHWH, and moreover I will not let Israel go.' And they said: 'The God of the Hebrews hath met with us. Let us go, we pray thee, three days' journey into the wilderness, and sacrifice unto YHWH our God; lest He fall upon us with pestilence, or with the sword.' Exodus 5:1-3
What we find here is that—according to the Bible that both Rabbi Ben Ammi and the Israeli Prime Minister referenced— Moses states the God of Israel told them to tell Pharoah to let His people go. He didn’t name the people; however, Pharoah responds by saying who is YHWH that he should listen to him and let Israel go? He further adds that he will not let Israel go!
From this we can conclude that the people Moses came to set free were named Israel, not Judah. Moses goes on to add that the God of the Hebrews had met with them, thereby indicating that the God of Israel also viewed them as Hebrews, making them Hebrew Israelites. The family of Judah did not become a separate body of people until after the whole family of Jacob, led by Joshua the Ephraimite, entered the land of Caanan… according to the Bible.
As the descendants of the family of Judah the Jewish people today have the history that the Prime Minister spoke of, however, Hebrew Israelites, the descendants of the Biblical Israelites, have a legacy just as valid: clearly Judah was included in the Israel that Moses was sent to, which makes the children of Judah Israelites, but it in no way works in reverse; there is no justification for referring to the people that Moses delivered as Judahites/Jews… according to the Bible.
All facts here!