The Israelites

Early/pre-history
There is almost no evidence of the Israelites or any of the tribes associated with before about 1200
BC. The earliest historical evidence of Israelites comes from the Egyptian Merneptah stele dated
1207 BC. This stele lists the Israelites as one of the tribes of Canaan (modern day Palestine).

The Bible/Torah
The bible is a collection of books taken from the Jewish books the Talmud and the Torah (not
including the New Testament). These books are the only historical document that exists for the pre-
history of the Israelites. However most scholars agree that the early history listed in the bible is
essentially mythological and not necessarily based on actual factual events. Many parts consist of
stories which were probably amalgamated from other cultures that the Canaanite tribes had contact
with. The story of Gilgamesh, which became the basis of the story of Noah is a good example of
this cultural transference.

The book of Genesis is regarded by most historians as having little historical value except to give
context to how the ancient peoples of Canaan regarded the idea of migration, their own origins and
belief in the relationship between various tribes and peoples. Much of the story of Genesis revolves
around peoples of Mesopotamia and probably were stories incorporated into culture through
cultural contact with peoples from the fertile crescent.

Much like the Greek stories of the Iliad and the Odyssey, which were written down in the 8th
century BC, but from analysis of the text and meter are thought to date from about 1400 -1500 BC.
The Mosaic books (the first five books) were written in the 8th Century BC and these stories had
been passed down orally for more than 600 years.

The Exodus
The story of the Exodus. The Israelites living in exile in slavery in Egypt is an important story
within the Jewish religion and culture in modern times. This is the origin of modern Easter
celebrations. Pasqua in Italian, Pascka in Greek and Pesach in Hebrew, mean ‘Passover’, which
celebrates for Jews the Angel of death passing over the houses of the Israelites, because they had
painted lambs blood above their doors, and the killing of all the firstborn sons of Egypt. This is why
the date of Easter changes every year, because it is taken from the Jewish lunar calendar, not the
Gregorian solar calendar.

Historically there has not been found much basis to this story. Much written evidence exists that the
pyramids were made by experienced craftsmen, who were well paid for their work. The Egyptians
did have slaves but there is no record of Semite slaves in large numbers. Most slaves were in fact
Egyptians. Semites were often employed however as mercenary soldiers because they had a
reputation as fierce fighters.

Some historians have proposed that the story of Moses comes from a group of escaped Egyptian
slaves, who later joined the Semitic tribes. Certainly the name Moses and his brother Aaron are
Egyptian names, not Semitic. Moses and Aaron were both from the tribe of Levi, who became the
priest caste in Jewish society. Recent studies of Levites (people who claim decent from the tribe of
Levi) has shown some evidence of genetic differences from other Semites, which may indicate this
Egyptian origin.

What is fairly certain is that the Israelites were one of the many tribes inhabiting Canaan in the 8th
century BC. These Semitic tribes were mainly pastoralists. As these tribes slowly turned to
agriculture, they began to develop more distinct tribal identities.

Early history
Although the Torah claims the Israelites to have been deadly enemies of the Canaanite and
Philistines, historically the opposite is true. The Israelites were one of the many tribes of Canaanite.
Archaeological evidence does not indicate conflict, but a gradual branching out from existing
cultures. Given the geographical location of the early Israelites (the Samarian highlands out towards
the Sinai desert), the groups who later became the Israelites may have been nomadic peoples pushed
out of the main Canaanite centres who then later joined together to form a singular tribe (contrary to
the ethnocentric concept of the bible).

Archeological evidence shows little difference between the various tribes of Canaan culturally. The
area of Canaan was disputed throughout the period between the Egyptian and Assyrian empires.
The effect of the victory Pharoh Tutmose III over Canaanite tribes in the 15th century BC (the first
ever recorded account of a battle) at the Canaanite city of Megiddo has been thought by many
historians to have had a profound effect on the psyche of the tribes. The Israelites would come to
name their mythological end of the world after this in the term (Ar-Megiddo) Armageddon.

Origins of Monotheism
Although from our often Western oriented perspective, Monotheism seems ‘normal’, in terms of
world religions, both past and present it is unusual. Most religions have and are now Pantheistic
(having many gods). The exact origins of Jewish monotheism are unknown. Historical evidence
from early writing and practice indicate that the early Israelites worshipped the Canaanite pantheon
of gods and probably slowly moved to Monolasticism (the belief in a pantheon but with one main
god). This may well have been influenced by the Zoroastrian religion practised in Persia. Other
historians have theorised that monotheism itself was brought to the Israelites from Egypt in the
period of the monotheism of Aten (which ties with historical claims of connection to Egyptians
joining the Israelite tribes).

As monotheism developed, it set the Israelites apart from other Canaanite tribes and became an
element of ethnic identity. This monotheistic religion developed over time, incorporating ideas from
other religions (Greeks – the concept of Hell, for example) and messianic (belief in a saviour)
features from the later conquests of the states of Israel and Judah.

The united kingdoms

The existence or not of the united kingdom of Israel is still disputed amongst historians. In the bible
this is stated to have been founded in the 10th century BC, by Saul, who was succeeded by David
and then his son Solomon, who built the great temple in Jerusalem. There is currently almost no
clear evidence of this period. From 850 BCE onwards a series of inscriptions are evidence of a
kingdom which its neighbours refer to as the "House of David.” Most historians agree that the
figure of king Solomon did exist in some form (although the actual name of Solomon may not be
correct, he is also called Jedidiah).

The empire and power of king Solomon listed in the bible is generally thought to be a vast
exaggeration and is not corroborated by Babylonian or Assyrian records of the time.
What most historians agree is that there was some sort of unified Israeli kingdom and that Solomon
if he existed reigned from about 970 BC to 931 BC. Shortly after this period there existed to
separate kingdoms of Judah (850 BC) in the south and Israel (900 BC) in the north. Although
Solomon is claimed in the bible to have built the temple in Jerusalem, little archaeological evidence
exists, but this is partly due to Muslims and Jews objecting to excavations in the area.

The Destruction of the Kingdoms.

The kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Assyrians in 750 BC. The kingdom of Judah continued
as a client kingdom of Assyria and then Babylon. The kingdom rebelled against Babylon and was
besieged and partially destroyed between 589-586 BC. Many Jews were exiled and only allowed to
return when the Persians overthrew the Babylonian empire in 539 BC and Judah was allowed to
exist as a client kingdom of the Persian empire. During this period of destruction and exile
monotheism became a fixed part of Jewish culture.

Judea became a part of the Persian empire until it was conquered by Alexander the Great, when it
passed to the rule of the Seleucid empire. Continual wars between the Seleucid and the Ptolemaic
empires heavily depopulated Judea.

In about 160 BC the Maccabeean revolts returned independence to the kingdom of Judah until in 63
BC the area came under Roman rule as a client state, including the first Roman siege of Jerusalem.

In 6 AD the kingdom of Judah was abolished and came under direct Roman rule as a province of
Rome. In 63 AD the Jews rebelled against Rome resulting in the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD
and the expulsion of most of the Jewish population, known as the Jewish diaspora.

The beginning of Christianity

It is generally agreed by historians that Jesus of Nazareth did exist, although the date of his birth
and age are obscure. Only two main facts are agreed upon by historians. His baptism by John the
Baptist and his death by crucifixion. This is agreed upon by the quantity of attestations of Jesus’
existence. The gospels of Jesus’ companions are generally agreed to have been written later, through
study of the texts and are considered to be collections of oral stories by a number of different
people, later collected and written down as a narrative. The seven epistles of St Paul are considered
genuine and the oldest original Christian writings, although Paul does not claim to have met Jesus
and gives little detail of his life.

The early Christians of the first century AD were Jews, within Palestine and in the Jewish diaspora.
Only later were ‘Gentiles’, or non circumcised people allowed into the church. This allowed the
popularisation of Christianity across the Roman empire. At first persecuted for being exclusive in
the multi-faith Roman empire and later installed as the state religion.
Language and Writing

Fig 1. Language tree showing origin and relation of languages.

Hebrew was the spoken and written language of the Israelites. This language developed from
ancient Pheonecian and has the same origin as the Minoan and then Greek languages and alphabet.
Hebrew is also directly related through proto-semetic languages to the languages of Ethiopia, Syriac
and other regional languages.

By the 2nd century BC, Hebrew started to fall out of use, due to its complexity and although it
survived as a religious language, it was superseded by Aramaic, a language closely related to
modern Arabic. Aramaic is still spoken in some parts of Syria and Jordan today. Jesus himself,
although he probably learned Hebrew, almost certainly spoke Aramaic.

During the Jewish diaspora, Hebrew was maintained as a religious language, but Jews adopted the
local languages of where they lived for day to day speaking. In they case of Yiddish, Jews mixed
German with Hebrew and Aramaic words. Many later religious texts were written in Aramaic rather
than Hebrew and today many Aramaic names are used for people and places.

When the state of Israel was declared in 1948, the government instituted a state policy of teaching
Hebrew to the Jewish population. Today 53% of Israeli Jews speak Hebrew fluently and 90% speak
Hebrew as a second language. It is the most successful revival of an essentially dead language in
known history. Because many words had not been used for such a long time, and because written
Hebrew does not use vowels, it is thought that many words do not have their original pronunciation.

Homework Task.
1). Look at figure 1 above (the tree of language development) and the document ‘Aramaic skeleton
grammar’ (pages 5 and 6, alphabet tables). Describe the similarities and differences between the
alphabets.
2). Why do you think the various alphabets changed so much from previous languages and from
other related modern languages?