How Many Israelites Should There Be?
Contents:
1. Introduction
2. The Blessings
3. Rebecca and the Thousands of Millions
4. A Majority People
5. Vast Numbers Involved Used as an Excuse to Doubt Israelite Identity.
6. Populations Explosions do occur. The Increase of the Israelites in Egypt Explained.
7. Hope for the Future. Still More are Coming!
The Bible says the Israelites would number many tens (or thousands) of millions. This is now a demographic reality. One of the attributes of the Ten Tribes is that they would comprise a significant proportion of world population. In the future they will number many more.
To read article please scroll down!
<p.
We dealt with the Promises that Israeli would number vast numbers of people in our previous articles and YouTube Clips on the subject.
2. The Blessings
According to Biblical Sources the Israelites were to number vast numbers of people. They were to be as the dust of the earth (Numbers 23:10), as sand of the sea (Genesis 22:17, 32:12, Isaiah 10:22, Hosea 1:10), and as stars of the heavens (Genesis 15:5, 22:17) for multitude.
3. Rebecca and the Thousands of Millions
Rebecca the fore-mother of Israel had been blessed that from her seed would emerge numerous people.
And they blessed Rebekah, and said unto her, Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them (Genesis 24:60).
The words translated by the KJ as thousands of millions In Hebrew are "Alfei Revavah" meaning literally "Thousands" [alfei] of ten thousands [revavah]" i.e. tens of millions.
The verse is indeed translated as tens of millions in the following translations,
[Taken from the List]
English Standard Version (2001)
New American Standard Bible (1995)
Holman Christian Standard Bible (2009)
International Standard Version (2012)
American Standard Version
Darby Bible Translation
English Revised Version
World English Bible
Young's Literal Translation
Darby Bible Translation
A few translations try to minimize the numbers
e.g.
Douay-Rheims Bible thousands of thousands,
New International Version (1984) (thousands upon thousands)
New Living Translation (2007) (many millions)
GOD'S WORD Translation (1995) (many thousands)
Webster's Bible Translation agrees with the KJ thousands of millions
so too,
Clarke's Commentary on the Bible: "Be thou the mother of thousands of millions - lealphey rebabah, for thousands ten thousand, or for myriads of thousand"
The King James translated it as thousands of millions as did,
Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible: It was prophesied that the Lost Ten Tribes would be extremely numerous
and number 100s of millions or more.
We thus see three options concerning this blessing to Rebecca (Rivkah) in Genesis 24:60,
1. Tens of millions: The majority opinion.
2. Many thousands (GWT) or many millions - a minority view.
3. Thousands of millions as per the KJ etc.
First of all the second opinion (2.) is not going according to the literal meaning of the text.
At the very least tens of millions are intended as shown in the first opinion.
The third opinion may be based on other sources. We suspect it may be correct. We can leave it open for the moment.
[We have since found Rabbinincal sources supporting this third opinion.]
4. A Majority People
Jacob (Israel) blessed the sons of Joseph, Ephraim and Manasseh, saying that they should become a multitude in the midst of the earth (Genesis 48:16). The word translated as a multitude in Hebrew is ROV which connotes majority. They were destined to become one of the major ethnic groups in world population.
5. Vast Numbers Involved Used as an Excuse to Doubt Israelite Identity.
We received a letter from Peter Salemi
"Brit-Am Now"- 501
#3. The Great Population Question
He quoted an argument saying that:
"In Jacob's day, the patriarch was, at a very, very conservative
estimate, one man in a world population of at least 6,000,000. The world's
population in Jacob's day was probably a lot greater than that, but
for the purpose of this discussion we'll say Jacob was one in six million
people on earth. The present combined populations of the alleged
British-Israel nations: Britain (Ephraim), the USA (Manasseh), Canada,
Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and western Europe (France
(Reuben) Denmark (Dan) Saxony (Isaac's sons) etc.) is about 1,000,000,000 (one
UK billion): which is approximately one sixth of the world's present
population of about 6,000,000,000 (six UK billion).
Now consider for a moment this astonishing fact. If the British Israel
theory were true, it would mean that Jacob's descendants somehow grew
from being one in six million to one in six! Statistically that is
impossible.
History provides no evidence whatsoever that the birth rate of other
nations (China, India, Africa etc.) virtually stood still whilst
Jacob's descendants (Britain, USA and western Europe) out-stripped them to
such an extent. If anything, history tells us the very opposite was true: the
population explosion occurred elsewhere (China, India and Africa); not
amongst the white races. In other words, statistically the theory
about Britain, the USA and western Europe being the Lost 10 Tribes of Israel
is a non-starter. It cannot be true.
How do you respond to this? Thanks Peter
Brit-Am Reply:
First of all the history is wrong. There were population explosions amongst the so-called white races. In Britain there were Agricultural Revolutions and Industrial Revolutions that caused the population to expand rapidly and greatly. For most of its history England was scarcely one-fifth the population of France. Then in the 1700s it was its equal.
After the discovery of the Americas corn (maize) was introduced to Africa and potatoes to Northern Europe. The population of Ireland expanded from very few to ten millions or more. Then came the Potato blight and famine and millions of Irishmen migrated to North America and elsewhere. The same happened in the rest of Europe.
World population
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Between 1700 and 1900, Europe's population increased from about 100 million to over 400 million.[ Altogether, the areas of European settlement comprised 36% of the world's population in 1900.
The second point is we see the Ten Tribes today as mainly being in the countries of USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, England, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, France. We emphasize however that descendants of the Ten Tribes do not comprise ALL of the peoples in those nations and in several cases may well be a minority that nevertheless was historically decisive.
6. Populations Explosions do occur. The Increase of the Israelites in Egypt Explained.
The first population explosion recorded in the Bible was that in Egypt.
Seventy males went down to Egypt with Jacob and his sons. They increased and multiplied until they numbered more than 600,000 males between the ages of 20 and 60 not counting the Tribe of Levi, and not counting those over 60 and younger than 20 and all the females. There was also a large "mixed multitude" of other peoples that left Egypt with them. Some opinions say that the mixed multitude outnumbered the actual Israelites.
They must have numbered 3 to 4 million or more. How can this increase be accounted for?
We will discuss this matter at more length later.
Suffice to say that according to the sources, they (apart from the Tribe of Levi) probably practised polygamy. There were more females than males but many males per family as seen in the large number of firstborn children who were later atoned for. There was some kind of freak combination of genetic predisposition, the area of Goshen they were stationed in, and the environment at that time. We see evidence of this today. They were enabled to give birth quickly and safely and recover almost at once, weaning children early and having more. They had multiple births of six or more. The children grew up quickly and strongly almost caring for themselves. They reached puberty early and entered the reproductive circle at once. Under such conditions four hundred years or less is plenty of time to reach the numbers described.
All this may describe a bit fantastic, a bit difficult to accept since we like things to be similar to our own time and situation. Nevertheless it is rational. It could have happened and evidently did.
The French Canadians were once a small minority in Canada. For a few decades they made an effort. Many women bore eleven or more children and within a SHORT TIME they had reached a sizable level. Population Explosions do occur.
Historically,
At the time of the Roman Empire there were 3 to 4 million or more Jews in the world and about an equal number of Chinese and maybe 2 million people in the British Isles. Later in the "Dark Ages" the population of Britain went down to about a million and that of the Jews to even less than a million.
You can play around with statistics any way you want but if the Jews representing 2 tribes (i.e. two-twelfths of the Israelites) had an equal population to China at that time and today China has an estimated 1,284,303,705 (July 2002 est.) people then multiplying that number by 6 (6 by 2 = 12) to get twelve tribes you have more than enough numbers even according to a maximalist explanation.
This is what would have happened if all the other tribes had had the same number of people as Judah and Benjamin and if they had have increased at the same rate that the Chinese did. They did not multiply as much as the Chinese did but they did multiply. The Chinese are not from the Ten Tribes. The Western Nations are. The western Nations represent the Ten Tribes. They did became a sizeable section of the world population. Perhaps in the future they will become even more. This is what was prophesied.
The question is not so much as to how so many people can be descended from the Ten Tribes but rather why there are still not much much more of them?
It was prophesied that the Lost Ten Tribes would be extremely numerous and numbers 100s of millions or more. They would be a majority people in the world (Genesis 48:16). We must therefore look for a group of peoples related to each other who do have such numbers as well as fulfilling all the other criteria given by the Bible.
Only the Brit-Am solution fulfills these conditions.
Moses blessed the Israelites,
# 10 The LORD your God has multiplied you, and here you are today, as the stars of heaven in multitude. 11 May the LORD God of your fathers make you a thousand times more numerous than you are, and bless you as He has promised you! # [Deuteronomy 1:10-11]
At that time they numbered more than 600,000 males who went out to war. A thousand times 600,000 makes 600 million males on to which must be added females and children under the age of twenty and men over the age of 60.
This was pointed out to us by Colbert Brian.
7. Hope for the Future. Still More are Coming.
We have not yet reached those numbers but in the future may do so. It is already feasible. This is what we should aspire to. We should strive to fulfill the blessings, commandments, and obligation that have been laid upon us. We should all do the best we can for this is what we are. May the God of Israel bless all of you. Yair Davidiy.
Important Note:
Rabbi Moshe ("Ha-Chatam") Sofer (1762-1839) was one of the leading Orthodox Rabbis of European Jewry in the early 1800s. Many of the leading Rabbis in succeeding generations were strongly influenced by him. In our time he is still often quoted and considered to have been a leading authority in legal Torah matters. The Chatam Softer (based on the Midrash Sifrei) said that "Revavah" means a multiplying factor of at least a million, when the context suggests it. See:Hundreds of Millions!-2articles/biblical-proof/blessings/billions1b.html
For More on this subject see: