According to the
Bible, the Israelites are the descendants of
Jacob, a
patriarch who was later renamed as Israel. Following a severe drought in
Canaan, Jacob and his twelve sons fled to Egypt, where they eventually formed the
Twelve Tribes of Israel. The Israelites were later
led out of slavery in Egypt by
Moses and
conquered Canaan under
Joshua's leadership, who was Moses's successor. Most modern scholars agree that the
Torah does not provide an authentic account of the Israelites' origins, and instead view it as constituting their
national myth. However, it is supposed that there may be a "historical core" to the narrative.[18][19][20] The Bible also portrays the kingdoms of Israel and Judah as the successors of an earlier
United Kingdom of Israel, though the historicity of the latter is disputed.[21][22]
The first reference to Israel in non-biblical sources is found in the
Merneptah Stele in c. 1209 BCE. The inscription is very brief and says: "Israel is laid waste and his seed is not". The inscription refers to a
people, not an individual or
nation state,[27] who are located in central
Palestine[28] or the highlands of
Samaria.[29] Some Egyptologists suggest that Israel appeared in earlier topographical reliefs, dating to the
Nineteenth Dynasty (i.e. reign of
Ramesses II) or the
Eighteenth Dynasty,[30] but this reading remains controversial.[31][32]
In the Hebrew Bible, Israel first appears in Genesis 32:29, where an angel gives the name to
Jacob after the
latter fought with him.[33][34][35] The
folk etymology given in the text derives Israel from yisra, "to prevail over" or "to struggle with", and El, a Canaanite-
Mesopotamiancreator god that is tenuously identified with Yahweh.[36][37] However, modern scholarship interprets El as the subject, "El rules/struggles",[38][39][40] from sarar (שָׂרַר) 'to rule'[41] (cognate with sar (שַׂר) 'ruler',[42]Akkadianšarru 'ruler, king'[43]), which is likely cognate with the similar root sara (שׂרה) "fought, strove, contended".[44][45]
Afterwards, Israel referred to the
direct descendants of Jacob and
gentiles (i.e.
resident aliens) who assimilated in the Israelite community.[46][47]Hebrew is a similar ethnonym but it is usually applied whenever Israelites are economically disadvantaged or migrants. It might also refer to their descent from
Eber, the grandson of
Noah.[48][49][50][51]
In literature of the
Second Temple period, "Israel" included the members of the united monarchy, the northern kingdom, and eschatological Israel. "
Jew" (or "
Judean") was another popular ethnonym but it might refer to a geographically restricted sub-group or to the inhabitants of the southern kingdom of Judah.[53][54] In addition, works such as
Ezra-Nehemiah pioneered the idea of an "impermeable" distinction between Israel and gentiles, on a genealogical basis.[47] Other scholars argue that the distinction is based on religion.[55]
In
Judaism, "Israelite", broadly speaking, refers to a
lay member of the Jewish ethnoreligious group, as opposed to the priestly orders of
Kohanim and
Levites. In legal texts, such as the
Mishnah and
Gemara, ישראלי (Yisraeli), or Israelite, is used to describe Jews instead of יהודי (Yehudi), or Jew. In
Samaritanism, Samaritans are not Jews יהודים (Yehudim). Instead, they are Israelites, which includes their Jewish brethren, or Israelite Samaritans.[56][57][full citation needed][58]
Biblical narrative
The history of the Israelite people can be divided into these categories, according to the
Hebrew Bible:[59]
As a monarchic state, the Israelite tribes were united by the leadership of
Saul,
David and
Solomon. The reigns of Saul and David were marked by military victories and Israel's transition to a mini-empire with
vassal states.[62][63] Solomon's reign was relatively more peaceful and oversaw the construction of the
First Temple,[64] with the help of
Phoenician allies.[65] This Temple was where the
Ark of the Covenant was stored; its former location was the
City of David.[66]
The monarchic state was divided into two states,
Israel and
Judah, due to civil and religious disputes. Eventually, Israel and Judah met their demise after the
Assyrian and
Babylonian invasions respectively. According to the
Biblical prophets, these invasions were divine judgments for religious apostasy and corrupt leadership.
After the Babylonians invaded Judah, they deported most of its citizens to Babylon, where they lived as "exiles".
Cyrus the Great conquered Babylon and established the
First Persian Empire in 539 BCE. [68] One year later, according to traditional dating, Cyrus
permitted the Judahites to return to their homeland.[68] This homeland was re-named as the
Province of Yehud, which eventually became a satrapy of
Eber-Nari.[68]
This period is covered by the entirety of the
Book of Daniel.
Persian Period (c. 539–331 BCE)
In 537–520 BCE,
Zerubbabel became Yehud's governor and started work on the
Second Temple, which was stopped.[69] In 520–516 BCE,
Haggai and
Zechariah goaded the Judahites to resume work on the Temple. Upon completion,
Joshua became its high priest.[69][69] In 458–433 BCE,
Ezra and
Nehemiah led another group of Judahites to Yehud, with
Artaxerxes's permission. Nehemiah rebuilt the temple after some unspecified disaster and removed foreign influence from the Judahite community.[70][71] That said, some Judahites elected to stay in Persia, where they
almost faced annihilation.[72][73]
Efforts to confirm the biblical ethnogenesis of Israel through
archaeology has largely been abandoned as unproductive.[20] Many scholars see the traditional narratives as
national myths with little historical value, but some posit that a small group of exiled Egyptians contributed to the Exodus narrative.[a]William G. Dever cautiously identifies this group with the
Tribe of Joseph, while
Richard Elliott Friedman identifies it with the
Tribe of Levi.[77][78]Josephus quoting
Manetho identifies them with the
Hyksos.[79][80] Other scholars believe that the Exodus narrative was a "
collective memory" of several events from the Bronze Age.[81][82]
Mark G. Brett suggests that the Israelites created different origin myths for themselves and other Canaanites to distance themselves from the latter[88] but some biblical traditions acknowledge the Canaanite/Amorite origins of Israel.[89][90][91]
Origins
Several theories exist for the origins of historical Israelites. Some believe they descended from raiding groups, itinerant nomads such as
Habiru and
Shasu or impoverished Canaanites, who were forced to leave wealthy urban areas and live in the highlands.[95][28] The prevailing academic opinion is that the Israelites were a mixture of peoples predominately indigenous to Canaan, with additional input from an Egyptian matrix of peoples, which most likely inspired the Exodus narrative.[96][97][98] Israel's demographics were similar to the demographics of
Ammon,
Edom,
Moab and
Phoenicia.[97][99][page needed]
Genealogy was another factor that differentiated the Israelites. It was a matter of cultural self-identity rather than biological descent. For example, foreign clans could adopt the identity of other clans, which subsequently changed their status from "outsider" to "insider". This applied to Israelites from different tribes and gentiles.[47][100] Saul Oylan argued that foreigners automatically became Israelite if they lived in their territory, according to
Ezekiel 47:21–23.[101] That said, Israelites used genealogy to engage in
narcissism of small differences but also, self-criticism since their ancestors included morally questionable characters such as Jacob. Both these traits represented the "complexities of the Jewish soul".[100]
In terms of appearance, the Hebrew Bible records figures, such as David, Esau and the lovers in the Song of Songs, as being "ruddy",[102][103] "white and ruddy" and "clear as the moon",[104][105] which aligned with descriptions of Levantine phenotypes in ancient Egyptian and Greek sources.[106][107][108][109][110] Rabbis, on the other hand, described the Biblical Jews as being "midway between black and white" and having the "color of the boxwood tree".[111]
Israelite men, like other western Semites, have full, round beards according to Egyptian and Assyrian inscriptions. In contrast, their neighbors, such as Babylonians and Egyptians, have long beards and chin tufts respectively but this was an upper-class custom. Joseph's act of shaving (
Genesis 41:14) was thought to resemble the Egyptian custom.[112]Merneptah's
Karnak reliefs indicate that the early Israelites dressed like other Canaanites, in terms of attire and hairstyle, compared to other groups like the Shasu.[113][114][115]
Early Israelite settlements
In the 12th century BCE, many Israelite settlements appeared in the central hill country of Canaan, which was formerly an open terrain. These settlements lacked evidence of pork consumption, compared to Philistine settlements, have
four-room houses and lived by an
egalitarian ethos, which was exemplified by the absence of elaborate tombs, governor's mansions, certain houses being bigger than others etc. They followed a
mixed economy, which prioritized
self-sufficiency,
cultivation of crops,
animal husbandry and
small-scalecraft production. New technologies such as
terraced farming,
silos for grain storage and
cisterns for rainwater collection were simultaneously introduced.[116]
These settlements were built by inhabitants of the "general Southland" (i.e. modern
Sinai and the southern parts of
Israel and
Jordan), who abandoned their pastoral-nomadic ways. Canaanites who lived outside the central hill country were tenuously identified as Danites, Asherites, Zebulunites, Issacharites, Naphtalites and Gadites. These inhabitants do not have a significant history of migration besides the Danites, who allegedly originate from the
Sea Peoples, particularly the
Dan(an)u.[116][117] Nonetheless, they intermingled with the former nomads, due to socioeconomic and military factors. Their interest in Yahwism and its concern for the underprivileged was another factor. Possible allusions to this historical reality in the Hebrew Bible include the aforementioned tribes, except for Issachar and Zebulun, descending from
Bilhah and
Zilpah, who were viewed as "secondary additions" to Israel.[116]
El worship was central to early Israelite culture but currently, the number of El worshippers in Israel is unknown. It is more likely that different Israelite locales held different views about El and had 'small-scale'
sacred spaces.[36][37]
The historicity of the United Monarchy is heavily debated among archaeologists and biblical scholars: biblical maximalists and centrists (
Kenneth Kitchen,
William G. Dever,
Amihai Mazar,
Baruch Halpern and others) argue that the biblical account is more or less accurate, biblical minimalists (
Israel Finkelstein,
Ze'ev Herzog,
Thomas L. Thompson and others) argue that Israel and Judah were always independent states. An intermediate view is that Judah was a 'vassal-like' state to Israel, under the
Omrides. The debate has not been resolved but recent archaeological discoveries by
Eilat Mazar and
Yosef Garfinkel show some support for the existence of the United Monarchy.[21][119]
From 850 BCE onwards, a series of inscriptions mention the "
House of David". They came from Israel's neighbors.[120][121]
Compared to the United Monarchy, the historicity of the Kingdom of Israel and Judah is widely accepted by historians and archaeologists.[122]: 169–195 [123] Their destruction by the Assyrians and Babylonians respectively is also confirmed by archaeological evidence and extrabiblical sources.[124][125][126][127]: 306 [128][129] Christian Frevel argues that Yahwism was rooted in the culture of the Kingdom of Israel, who introduced it to the Kingdom of Judah via
Ahab's expansions and sociopolitical cooperation, which was prompted by
Hazael's conquests.[119]
Avraham Faust argues that there was continued adherence to the 'ethos of egalitarianism and simplicity' in the Iron Age II (10th-6th century BCE). For example, there is minimal evidence for temples and complex burials in tombs, despite Israel and Judah being more densely populated than the Late Bronze Age. Four-room houses remained the norm. In addition, royal inscriptions were scarce, along with imported and decorated pottery.[130]
The
Cyrus Cylinder is controversially cited as evidence for Cyrus allowing the
Judeans to return to Yehud.[131][132] The returnees showed a "heightened sense" of their ethnic identity and shunned
exogamy, which was treated as a "permissive reality" in Babylon.[133][134] Circumcision was no longer a significant ethnic marker, with increased emphasis on genealogical descent or faith in Yahweh.[135][136]
Exiled non-Judean Israelites were not given the same treatment and assimilated with the local Assyrian population.[137] They were a minority, with the majority remaining in Israel.[138] Contrary to Jewish tradition,[139] the latter were progenitors of the Samaritans, who followed
Samaritanism. Only some of the population intermarried with Assyrian settler-colonists, according to genetic and archaeological evidence.[140][141] In their native
Samaritan Hebrew, the Samaritans identify as "Israel", "B'nai Israel" or "Shamerim/Shomerim" (i.e. "Guardians/Keepers/Watchers").[142][143][144][145]
A 2004 study (by Shen et al.) comparing Samaritans to several Jewish populations (including
Ashkenazi Jews,
Iraqi Jews,
Libyan Jews,
Moroccan Jews, and
Yemenite Jews) found that "the principal components analysis suggested a common ancestry of Samaritan and Jewish patrilineages. Most of the former may be traced back to a common ancestor in what is today identified as the paternally inherited Israelite high priesthood (
Cohanim), with a common ancestor projected to the time of the
Assyrian conquest of the kingdom of Israel."[169][dubious –
discuss]
A 2020 study (by Agranat-Tamr et al.) stated that there was genetic continuity between Bronze Age and Iron Age southern Levantines, which included the Israelites and Judahites. They could be "modeled as a mixture of local earlier
Neolithic populations and populations from the northeastern part of the Near East (e.g.
Zagros Mountains,
Caucasians/
Armenians and possibly,
Hurrians). Reasons for the continuity include resilience from the
Bronze Age collapse, which was mostly true for inland cities such as
Tel Megiddo and
Tel Abel Beth Maacah. Elsewhere,
European-related and
East African-related components were added to the population, from a north-south and south-north gradient respectively.
Late Neolithic and
Bronze Age Europeans and
Somalis were used as representatives.[170]
^"While there is a consensus among scholars that the Exodus did not take place in the manner described in the Bible, surprisingly most scholars agree that the narrative has a historical core, and that some of the highland settlers came, one way or another, from Egypt ..." "Archaeology does not really contribute to the debate over the historicity or even historical background of the Exodus itself, but if there was indeed such a group, it contributed the Exodus story to that of all Israel. While I agree that it is most likely that there was such a group, I must stress that this is based on an overall understanding of the development of collective memory and of the authorship of the texts (and their editorial process). Archaeology, unfortunately, cannot directly contribute (yet?) to the study of this specific group of Israel's ancestors."[76]
^Finkelstein, Israel. "Ethnicity and origin of the Iron I settlers in the Highlands of Canaan: Can the real Israel stand up?" The Biblical Archaeologist 59.4 (1996): 198–212.
^Finkelstein, Israel. The archaeology of the Israelite settlement. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1988.
^Finkelstein, Israel, and Nadav Na'aman, eds. From nomadism to monarchy: archaeological and historical aspects of early Israel. Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, 1994.
^Finkelstein, Israel. "The archaeology of the United Monarchy: an alternative view". Levant 28.1 (1996): 177–187.
^
abMark Smith in "The Early History of God: Yahweh and Other Deities of Ancient Israel" states "Despite the long regnant model that the Canaanites and Israelites were people of fundamentally different culture, archaeological data now casts doubt on this view. The material culture of the region exhibits numerous common points between Israelites and Canaanites in the Iron I period (c. 1200–1000 BCE). The record would suggest that the Israelite culture largely overlapped with and derived from Canaanite culture ... In short, Israelite culture was largely Canaanite in nature. Given the information available, one cannot maintain a radical cultural separation between Canaanites and Israelites for the Iron I period." (pp. 6–7). Smith, Mark (2002). The Early History of God: Yahweh and Other Deities of Ancient Israel. Eerdmans.
^
abRendsberg, Gary (2008). "Israel without the Bible". In Frederick E. Greenspahn. The Hebrew Bible: New Insights and Scholarship. NYU Press. pp. 3–5.
^Gnuse, Robert Karl (1997). No Other Gods: Emergent Monotheism in Israel. England: Sheffield Academic Press. pp. 28, 31.
ISBN1-85075-657-0.
^Haran, Menahem (1996).
Texts, Temples and Traditions. Eisenbrauns.
ISBN978-1-57506-003-3. It is also clear that there were polytheistic Yahwists in ancient Israel who worshiped YHWH along with other deities
^Faust 2015, p.476: "While there is a consensus among scholars that the Exodus did not take place in the manner described in the Bible, surprisingly most scholars agree that the narrative has a historical core, and that some of the highland settlers came, one way or another, from Egypt ...".
^Redmount 2001, p. 61: "A few authorities have concluded that the core events of the Exodus saga are entirely literary fabrications. But most biblical scholars still subscribe to some variation of the Documentary Hypothesis, and support the basic historicity of the biblical narrative."
^
abDever, William (2001).
What Did the Biblical Writers Know, and When Did They Know It?. Eerdmans. pp. 98–99.
ISBN3-927120-37-5. After a century of exhaustive investigation, all respectable archaeologists have given up hope of recovering any context that would make Abraham, Isaac, or Jacob credible 'historical figures' ... archaeological investigation of Moses and the Exodus has similarly been discarded as a fruitless pursuit.
^Lipschits, Oded (2014). "The history of Israel in the biblical period". In Berlin, Adele; Brettler, Marc Zvi (eds.).
The Jewish Study Bible (2nd ed.). Oxford University Press. pp. 2107–2119.
ISBN978-0-19-997846-5.
Archived from the original on 9 April 2023. Retrieved 16 May 2022. As this essay will show, however, the premonarchic period long ago became a literary description of the mythological roots, the early beginnings of the nation and the way to describe the right of Israel on its land. The archeological evidence also does not support the existence of a united monarchy under David and Solomon as described in the Bible, so the rubric of 'united monarchy' is best abandoned, although it remains useful for discussing how the Bible views the Israelite past. ... Although the kingdom of Judah is mentioned in some ancient inscriptions, they never suggest that it was part of a unit comprised of Israel and Judah. There are no extrabiblical indications of a united monarchy called 'Israel'.
^Adams, Hannah (1840). The history of the Jews: from the destruction of Jerusalem to the present time. Duncan and Malcolm and Wertheim.
OCLC894671497.
^Brenner, Michael (2010). A short history of the Jews. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
ISBN978-0-691-14351-4.
OCLC463855870.
^Van der Veern, Peter, et al. "Israel in Canaan (Long) Before Pharaoh Merenptah? A Fresh Look at Berlin Statue Pedestal Relief 21687". Journal of Ancient Egyptian Interconnections. pp. 15–25.
^Romer, Thomas (2015). The Invention of God, Harvard. p. 75.
^Dijkstra, Meindert (2017). "Canaan in the Transition from the Late Bronze to the Early Iron Age from an Egyptian Perspective". In Grabbe, Lester, ed. The Land of Canaan in the Late Bronze Age. Bloomsbury. p. 62, n. 17
^Flavius Josephus -
Antiquities of The Jews, Book I, Chapter VI, Paragraph 4:
Greek: Ἀρφαξάδου δὲ παῖς γίνεται Σάλης, τοῦ δὲ Ἕβερος, ἀφ᾽ οὗ τοὺς Ἰουδαίους Ἑβραίους ἀρχῆθεν ἐκάλουν: Ἕβερος δὲ Ἰούκταν καὶ Φάλεγον ἐγέννησεν: ἐκλήθη δὲ Φάλεγος, ἐπειδὴ κατὰ τὸν ἀποδασμὸν τῶν οἰκήσεων τίκτεται: φαλὲκ γὰρ τὸν μερισμὸν Ἑβραῖοι καλοῦσιν.,
lit. 'Sala was the son of Arphaxad; and his son was Heber, from whom they originally called the Jews Hebrews. Heber begat Joetan and Phaleg: he was called Phaleg, because he was born at the dispersion of the nations to their several countries; for Phaleg among the Hebrews signifies division.'
^Cate, Robert L. (1990). "Israelite". In Mills, Watson E.; Bullard, Roger Aubrey.
Mercer Dictionary of the Bible. Mercer University Press. p. 420.
^Van Maaren, John (23 May 2022). "The Ethnic Boundary Making Model: Preliminary Marks". The Boundaries of Jewishness in the Southern Levant 200 BCE – 132 CE. De Gruyter. p. 5.
^Danker, Frederick W. "Ioudaios", in A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature. third edition University of Chicago Press.
ISBN978-0-226-03933-6
^John Bowman (1977). Samaritan Documents Relating to Their History, Religion and Life. Pittsburgh Original Texts and Translations Series No. 2.
ISBN0-915138-27-1.
^Friedman, Richard Elliott (12 September 2017).
The Exodus. HarperCollins.
ISBN978-0-06-256526-6.
Archived from the original on 1 July 2023. Retrieved 15 May 2022.
^K. L. Noll (2001).
Canaan and Israel in Antiquity: An Introduction.
Archived 1 July 2023 at the
Wayback Machine A&C Black. p. 164: "It would seem that, in the eyes of Merneptah's artisans, Israel was a Canaanite group indistinguishable from all other Canaanite groups." "It is likely that Merneptah's Israel was a group of Canaanites located in the Jezreel Valley."
^Moore Cross, Frank (1997). Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic: Essays in History of the Religion of Israel. Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 62.
ISBN0-674-09176-0.
^Kuzar, Ron (2001). Hebrew and Zionism: a discourse analytic cultural study. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. p. 235.
ISBN3-11-016993-2.
^Gabriel, Richard A. (2003).
The Military History of Ancient Israel. Greenwood. p. 63: "The ethnically mixed character of the Israelites is reflected even more clearly in the foreign names of the group's leadership. Moses himself, of course, has an Egyptian name. But so do Hophni, Phinehas, Hur, and Merari, the son of Levi."
^"The first are RETH, the second are AAMU, the third are NEHESU, and the fourth are THEMEHU. The RETH are Egyptians, the AAMU are dwellers in the deserts to the east and north-east of Egypt, the NEHESU are the
Cushites, and the THEMEHU are the fair-skinned Libyans". Book of Gates,
chapter VI (
Archived 10 March 2016 at the
Wayback Machine), translated by E. A. Wallis Budge, 1905.
^Thavapalan 2019, pp. 155–156: "As a point of correlation to visual culture, one can observe that in Egyptian art too, Nubians from the south are painted black. Egyptian natives were portrayed with a red-brown complexion, Syrians or Asiatic peoples from the north and east were shown in pale tones and Libyans from the west were represented in white".
^Hasel, Michael G. (2003). Nakhai, Beth Alpert (ed.). "Merenptah's Inscription and Reliefs and the Origin of Israel (The Near East in the Southwest: Essays in Honor of William G. Dever)". Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research. 58. Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research: 27–36.
ISBN0-89757-065-0.
JSTOR3768554.
^Mark W. Bartusch, Understanding Dan: an exegetical study of a biblical city, tribe and ancestor, Volume 379 of Journal for the study of the Old Testament: Supplement series, Continuum International Publishing Group, 2003
^Delitzsch, Friedrich; McCormack, Joseph; Carruth, William Herbert; Robinson, Lydia Gillingham (1906).
Babel and Bible;. Chicago: The Open Court. p. 78.
^Finkelstein, Israel; Silberman, Neil Asher (2001). The Bible unearthed: archaeology's new vision of ancient Israel and the origin of its stories (1st Touchstone ed.). New York: Simon & Schuster.
ISBN978-0-684-86912-4.
^Lyman, Stanford M. (1998). "The Lost Tribes of Israel as a Problem in History and Sociology". International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society. 12 (1): 7–42.
doi:
10.1023/A:1025902603291.
JSTOR20019954.
S2CID141243508.
^Pummer, Reinhard (2016). The Samaritans: A Profile. Eerdmans. p. 13.
ISBN978-0-8028-6768-1.
^Cline, Eric H. (2008). From Eden to Exile: Unraveling Mysteries of the Bible. National Geographic (US).
ISBN978-1-4262-0208-7.
^Shen, Peidong; Lavi, Tal; Kivisild, Toomas; Chou, Vivian; Sengun, Deniz; Gefel, Dov; Shpirer, Issac; Woolf, Eilon; Hillel, Jossi; Feldman, Marcus W.; Oefner, Peter J. (2004). "Reconstruction of patrilineages and matrilineages of Samaritans and other Israeli populations from Y-Chromosome and mitochondrial DNA sequence Variation". Human Mutation. 24 (3): 248–260.
doi:
10.1002/humu.20077.
ISSN1059-7794.
PMID15300852.
S2CID1571356.
^Bowman, John (8 February 1963). "BANŪ ISRĀ'ĪL IN THE QUR'ĀN". Islamic Studies. 2 (4). Islamic Research Institute: 447–455.
JSTOR20832712. This tiny community called by the Jews and the Christians, the Samaritans, call themselves Israel or Shomerim, the Keepers (of the Torah, i.e., Tawr?t).
^"The Samaritan Identity". The Israelite Samaritan Community in Israel. Retrieved 15 September 2023. Our real name is, 'Bene- Yisrael Ha -Shamerem (D'nU- -D'7nU) - in Hebrew , which means 'The Keepers', or to be precise, the Israelite - Keepers, as we observe the ancient Israelite tradition, since the time of our prophet Moses and the people of Israel. The modern terms, 'Samaritans' and 'Jews', given by the Assyrians, indicate the settlement of the Samaritans in the area of Samaria, and the Jews in the area of Judah.
^"The Keepers: Israelite Samaritan Identity". Israelite Samaritan Information Institute. 26 May 2020. Retrieved 15 September 2023. We are not Samaritans; this is what the Assyrians called the people of Samaria. We, The Keepers, Sons of Israel, Keepers of the Word of the Torah, never adopted the name Samaritans. Our forefathers only used the name when speaking to outsiders about our community. Through the ages we have referred to ourselves as The Keepers.
^Sand, Shlomo; Ilany, Ofri (21 March 2008).
"Shattering a 'National Mythology'". Haaretz.
Tel Aviv. Archived from
the original on 24 May 2018. Retrieved 30 August 2020. The people did not spread, but the Jewish religion spread. Judaism was a converting religion. Contrary to popular opinion, in early Judaism there was a great thirst to convert others. The
Hasmoneans were the first to begin to produce large numbers of Jews through mass conversion, under the influence of
Hellenism. The conversions between the
Hasmonean Revolt and
Bar Kochba's rebellion are what prepared the ground for the subsequent, wide-spread
dissemination of Christianity. After the
victory of Christianity in the fourth century, the momentum of conversion was stopped in the Christian world, and there was a steep drop in the number of Jews. Presumably many of the Jews who appeared around the Mediterranean became Christians. But then Judaism started to permeate other regions – pagan regions, for example, such as
Yemen and
North Africa. Had Judaism not continued to advance at that stage and had it not continued to convert people in the pagan world, we would have remained a completely marginal religion, if we survived at all.
^A. T. Kraabel, J. Andrew Overman, Robert S. MacLennan, Diaspora Jews and Judaism: essays in honor of, and in dialogue with, A. Thomas Kraabel (1992),
Scholars Press,
ISBN978-15-55406-96-7. "As pious gentiles, the God-fearers stood somewhere between Greco-Roman piety and Jewish piety in the synagogue. In his classic but now somewhat outdated study titled Judaism in the First Centuries of the Christian Era, Harvard scholar George Foot Moore argued that the existence of the God-fearers provides evidence for the synagogue's own missionary work outside of Palestine during the first century C.E. The God-fearers were the result of this Jewish missionary movement."
^Gil, Moshe. [1983] 1997. A History of Palestine, 634–1099. Cambridge University Press. pp. 222–3: "
David Ben-Gurion and
Yitzhak Ben-Zvi claimed that the population at the time of the Arab conquest was mainly Christian, of Jewish origins, which underwent conversion to avoid a tax burden, basing their argument on 'the fact that at the time of the Arab conquest, the population of Palestine was mainly Christian, and that during the Crusaders' conquest some four hundred years later, it was mainly Muslim. As neither the Byzantines nor the Muslims carried out any large-scale population resettlement projects, the Christians were the offspring of the Jewish and Samaritan farmers who converted to Christianity in the Byzantine period; while the Muslim fellaheen in Palestine in modern times are descendants of those Christians who were the descendants of Jews, and had turned to Islam before the Crusaders' conquest."
Faust, Avraham (2015).
"The Emergence of Iron Age Israel: On Origins and Habitus". In Levy, Thomas E.; Schneider, Thomas; Propp, William H. C. (eds.). Israel's Exodus in Transdisciplinary Perspective: Text, Archaeology, Culture, and Geoscience. Springer. pp. 467–482.
ISBN978-3-319-04768-3.
Archived from the original on 21 October 2021. Retrieved 31 March 2023.
Joffe, Alexander H. (2002). "The Rise of Secondary States in the Iron Age Levant". Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient. 45 (4): 425–467.
doi:
10.1163/156852002320939311.
JSTOR3632872.
Coote, Robert B.; Whitelam, Keith W. (1986). "The Emergence of Israel: Social Transformation and State Formation Following the Decline in Late Bronze Age Trade". Semeia (37): 107–47.
Mazar, Amihay (2007). "The Divided Monarchy: Comments on Some Archaeological Issues". In Schmidt, Brian B. (ed.).
The Quest for the Historical Israel. Society of Biblical Literature.
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Archived from the original on 1 July 2023. Retrieved 14 August 2015.