Dear Dr. Bristol,
....While studying prophecy and Revelation I have come to believe that the people of G-d, who He talks to through His prophets, are both the "house of Judah" and the "house of Israel" It seems that ever since Solomon died and the nation of Israel split into two different nations G-d has continued to prophesized to both houses. The long held belief that the northern nation or "house of Israel" has disappeared for good does not seem to be justified.
For example, the nation of Israel split up in 930 BC and the house of Israel fell to the Assyrians in 722 BC. Jeremiah, the prophet, was born and lived after the northern tribe disappeared, from about 627-586 BC. This clearly puts Jeremiah on this earth 100 years after the fall of the "house of Israel" yet in the book of Jeremiah he clearly prophesized about both of the houses. You can see that in Jeremiah 2:4 and Jeremiah 2:26, among many other examples, and talks about the backsliding Israel and the treacherous Judah (Jer 3:6-22), clearly describing both tribes. In this whole book you must separate out who G-d is talking to, the "house of Israel" or the "house of Judah".
Ezekiel, who prophesized around 571 BC, more then 100 years after the house of Israel was conquered, also uses the phrase "house of Israel" (Eze 11:5 & 15) and talks to who can only be, the lost house of Israel. The books of Hosea, Amos, Micah, Zechariah, and Hebrews all have this distinction. And not to be out done, even Jesus Christ himself talks about the lost house of Israel in Matthew (Mat 10:6 and Mat 15:24) when he talks about the lost sheep of the "house of Israel". These references are to a house that is long gone (or so we thought) and cannot be referring to any of the current Jewish people or house of Judah.
I had always assumed and I believe most Christians think that G-d is only talking to the now-day Jewish people, that the current nation of Israel is and was the only group of G-ds people on this earth. The one Bible that hides this fact is the NIV, because it does not make this distinction very well in their translation and most of the folks in my church use the NIV. To really see this difference you need to look at the KJV/NKJ or some other version of the Bible. (Speaking of which, what Bible version do you think has the best translation for studying? (In English of course))
This seems to be a big mystery that no one cares about (at least at my church). This information makes a big difference in how you read and understand most of the second half of the Bible, especially revelation. I have now read stories of archeology in which this (migration of the northern tribe/house) point has been verified by digs in ancient Assyrian cities. It seems that the lost nation of Israel has migrated to become most of Europe with the birthright nations (Ephraim and Manasseh) being Great Britain (company of nations, (Gen 35:11), (Gen 48:19)) and the United States (a nation, a great nation, (Gen 35:11), (Gen 48:19)). This also makes since as the promises of G-d to Abraham (wealth, riches and abundance) have never happened or been realized in today's Jewish people, they have never become a great nation and a company of nations. There are many other facts in the Bible to back this up but I will stop here for now.
So my question in this letter is this. Do you believe that the northern "house of Israel", which disappeared from the Bible in 2 Kings, is still around today? Do you think that most of the Bible believing populations of the earth today are none other than descendants of the tribes of the northern nation? This belief that I have come to harbor will make a great difference in how I interpret revelation. In other words, if this is true, then most of the prophecies in the Bible are directed at a people who do not even know that they may be descendants of Israel.
Thanks for your input,
XXXXX
Dear XXXXX
You have started to explore an area that is gaining great popularity as of late. There is a northern kingdom that was conquered and the people dispersed throughout the world. Who are these people? While there are some who say the Church is the remnants of these people, I don't believe this. The church was established to a large degree in Rome by non-Jews who were not related to the dispersed Northern Kingdom.
The people of the Northern Kingdom have ended up through out the world and there is a belief that these people are those "Gentiles with a Jewish Heart for Israel." This is a heartwarming thought but can not be proven. We do find people who are showing up as Jewish from DNA testing in the most amazing places. That the northern tribe was scattered through out the world is a truth. Exactly who those people are now thousands of years latter is an area of speculation that lacks hard evidence.
Some websites exist on this subject. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_House_Movement is a good start and from there you can do a Google search that will show hundreds of thousands of websites dedicated to this theology.
Personally I find the theory possible but am not compelled to espouse to it. My focus is more on our daily walk then what happened to the Lost Tribes of Israel. this is not said to belittle those who focus on this area of study, it just isn’t my calling.
Shalom,
Richard Bristol, PhD
