Saturday, January 14, 2012

Where Exactly Is Biblical Israel?

'Not in the Bible itself. The Hebrew Bible (known to Christians as the Old Testament and to Jews as the Torah or Tanakh) contains five different "maps." These "maps" aren't pictures, but lists of boundaries that define the Promised Land. None of them resemble the modern-day "Biblical Israel." One map -- surprisingly found in the book of Joshua, which describes an all-out holy war -- suggests a regional federation in which the tribes of Israel overlap and coexist with local inhabitants. Joshua chapter 15, verse 63 even states: "the Jebusites (local inhabitants of Jerusalem) and the People of Judah dwell together in Jerusalem until today." This not only sounds like contemporary Jerusalem -- a mixed city of Palestinians and Israelis -- but also like a prophecy of how the division of Jerusalem might give way to dwelling together.'



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