Tag Archives: House of Israel

Genesis 42–46 Two Brothers and the Two Houses of Israel in End-Time Prophecy (Pt 1)

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I post this  teaching nearly every year. Some of you have read it before, but we have many new readers to this blog who haven’t read it. Hopefully this post will be a blessing to both our old and new friends. It contains very important truths relevant to understanding Bible prophecy and end times events. Parts 2 and 3 will follow.  Enjoy!

Natan

Biblical Types and Antetypes

A major key to understanding biblical prophecy is to recognize the relationship between antetypes and types in the Scriptures. This means that an event or a series of events occurred once, was recorded in the Scriptures, and then at a later time a similitude of the event repeats itself, but with different characters and scene.

An antetype is a type or pattern of something that occurs before the actual event occurs (sometimes incorrectly referred to as an antitype, which means opposite rather than before). In other words, the first event predicts or points prophetically to the future event. This is a way for the Creator to give clues and hints about future events that will come to pass. Those who are ardent students of his Word and those “who have (spiritual) ears to hear” will pick up on these clues and be able to have a sense of what the Creator is going to do at some future date. In this way, those who diligently seek him are rewarded with understanding or “inside information” about what he is planning to do in the future. At the same time, his divine plans and purposes will be obscured from those who don’t have a diligent heart to seek him Continue reading →

 

New Video: Genesis to Revelation — The Reunification of the Two Houses of Israel

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The reunification of the two houses of Israel (the Jews and the Christians) around the Torah and the testimony of Yeshua is prophesied from one end of the Bible to the other. This is a major biblical theme and a key aspect of the gospel message that has been overlooked by Christian Bible teachers, but it affects you and your spiritual destiny as this video shows.

 

Who Are the Lost Sheep of the House of Israel?

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Matthew 10:6, Lost sheep of the house of Israel. The phrase the house of Israel has several different possible meanings depending on the context of the surrounding verses in which it is found. The phrase the house of Israel is used 146 times in the Scriptures. Prior to the division of the united kingdom after the death of Solomon, this phrase referred to all twelve tribes of Israel. Afterwards (during the time of the prophets), it was used in contradistinction to the phrase “house of Judah” in reference to the Northern Kingdom.

herd of white sheep

In the Testimony of Yeshua, Yeshua makes reference to the “lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matt 10:6; 15:54). Elsewhere in the Testimony of Yeshua this term refers to all twelve tribes of Israel (Acts 2:36; 7:42; Heb 8:10), and in some references it refers to just the Northern Kingdom (Heb 8:8). The context of the passage of scripture surrounding this phrase determines its meaning.

Although this phrase can include all the tribes of Israel and not just the Jews who were largely from the tribe of Judah, in Matthew 10:6, Yeshua seems to equate the lost sheep of the house of Israel with the Jews who were living in the land of Israel in his day, and not to the rest of the Israelite tribes who were at that time scattered among the Gentile nations. It was Yeshua’s priority to take the gospel message first to the Jews in Jerusalem and Judea, and then to the rest of the world, and he expected his disciples to follow this same pattern (Acts 1:8).

In the larger sense, the Scriptures reveal that all of YHVH’s people have been like sheep that have gone astray spiritually, every man to his own way, because of sin (Isa 53:6). So in the broadest sense, this phrase refers to all the tribes of Israel including Gentiles with which they have mixed themselves through intermarriage.

Eventually, the gospel message is for everyone universally. Yeshua demonstrated this when, on several occasions, he ministered to non-Jewish Gentiles including preaching the gospel message to the Samaritan woman in John chapter four. 

 

The Lost Sheep of Israel Regathered in the Last Days

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Deuteronomy 30:3, From all the nations to which YHVH … has scattered you. The Scriptures over and over again record that the house of Israel (Ephraim) would be scattered over the face of the whole earth (Ezek 34:6, 12; 36:19; 37:21; John 11:52), and that YHVH will regather them in the end times and return them to the land of Israel (Deut 30:3–5). Deuteronomy 32:26 says, “I said, I would scatter them into the corners …” The ArtScroll Stone Edition Chumash comments, “This refers to the exile of the Ten Tribes, who were scattered to an unknown place where they have never been heard from again.

Unknown

On the phrase of the same verse, “I would make the remembrance of them to cease from among men. …” the same Chumash states,

This is a reference to the exile of Judah and Benjamin, the Davidic kingdom from which today’s known Jews are descended.” It goes on to say that though nations would seek to destroy Israel entirely, YHVH would never allow Israel to become extinct or disappear. Israel’s perpetual existence is a constant reminder of YHVH’s plan and eventually Israel will thrive and fulfill YHVH’s intention for it (pp. 1105–1106).

Nineteenth orthodox Jewish scholar S. R. Hirsch in his commentary on the same verse translates the phrase, “I would scatter them into the corners …” as, “I would relegate them into a corner …,” and then says that the Hebrew here refers to the “extreme end of a surface, the side or corner ….” He, too, relates this fate to the Ten Tribes who would be scattered “to some distant corner of the world, where, left entirely to themselves, they could mature towards serious reflection and ultimate return to Me …” (p. 650).

Some in the Christians deny that these Scriptures passages pertain to the ten tribes of the Northern Kingdom of Israel and instead insist that they are speaking about Judah (the Jews) only. They insist that the return of the Jews to the land of Israel starting in 1948 is the fulfillment of these prophecies and the ten tribes of Israel are lost forever. How can this a correct understanding in light of the Scriptures and the Jewish sages interpretations of those scriptures that states again and again that the ten tribes will return at the end of the age to be reunited with the Jews under the reign of Messiah Son of David (Ezek 37:15–28)?

Who are these lost and scattered sheep of the house of Israel? Whoever they are, Yeshua said that he came to regather them, and sent out his disciples on the same mission (Matt 10:6; 15:24. Yeshua then commissioned his disciples not only to go to the Jews in Jerusalem and to Judea, but to all the tribes of Israel scattered through the earth and anyone else who YHVH was calling into his eternal kingdom (Acts 2:8).

The following is a list of references in the Testimony of Yeshua about regathering the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

References in the Testimony of Yeshua to the Regathering of the Tribes of Israel

Yeshua himself made several references to the fact that it was his mission to regather the Continue reading →

 

The Heart of YHVH Behind the Second Passover

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Numbers 9:6–11, Defiled by a human corpse. This passage can also be understood allegorically. The second Passover is a prophetic picture pertaining to the lost and scattered sheep of the house of Israel who, like those individuals in this passage, had been journeying in exile (just like the prodigal son in Yeshua’s parable) among the Gentiles in a foreign land and away from the land and Elohim of Israel. In the process of their spiritual wandering, they have become defiled by sin and death (likened here to touching a human corpse), since the wages of sin is death (Rom 6:23), and all have men have sinned and fallen short of the YHVH’s glory (Rom 3:23).

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While in exile (again like the prodigal son in the parable), they awake to their spiritual apostasy and want to come back home to observe the Passover (a picture of redemption or salvation). Passover is the only biblical festival for which YHVH’s allows a make up. At the first Passover in Egypt, those who weren’t in their houses under the lamb’s blood-painted doors fell under the death penalty for sin and were killed.

This teaches us that Passover is a picture of man’s obtaining salvation through the blood of Yeshua, the Messiah who is the Lamb of Elohim. YHVH desires that all men be saved and come to know Yeshua the Savior, and Passover is a picture of this. This is why he gives men a second chance to keep the Passover—he wants all to be saved (John 3:16; 2 Pet 3:9), including his lost, scattered, exiled and prodigal children from the house of Israel.

 

New Video: Is the Two-House Message Biblical or Not?

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Based off of Genesis 48.

Is the commonly called “two house” or “two-stick” message” of the Bible something we should study? Are there any spiritual and prophetic benefits to understanding who the two houses of Israel are? The answer is yes. I would prefer to call it the “One House Message,” since this biblical truth involves the regathering and reunification of the Jews (the house of Judah) and the Christians (the house of Israel or Ephraim) into one nation through Yeshua the Messiah. This is the one new man message Paul proclaimed in Ephesians chapter two. This is the great and largely overlooked truth behind the message of the gospel of Yeshua the Messiah. In this video, you will discover the twelve benefits of understanding who the two houses of Israel are and how it relates to you.

 

The Tribes of Israel: Their Dispersion and Ultimate Return

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My apologies, but in my print version of this article, I have numerous footnote references, which, sadly, don’t come through in this online version. If you need the footnotes, please email me and I’ll send you a pdf of this article with the footnotes. You can reach me at natan@hoshanarabbah.org.

A Brief History Lesson

When the children of Israel exited Egypt, they were one nation composed of twelve tribes. Contrary to popular opinion, the Jews (from the tribe of Judah) were only one-twelfth of that nation — not the whole nation. At Mount Sinai, that nation made a covenant with YHVH Elohim to obey him and keep his commandments with the Torah as the nation’s constitution. In return, YHVH promised to bless and  protect the nation of Israel. Several hundred years later, the nation of Israel began to turn away from its covenantal promises by not adhering to its Torah-constitution and by worshipping pagan deities. The result of this apostasy was that the nation of Israel split in two becoming two nations: the Northern Kingdom (composed of the tribe of Ephraim and nine other tribes) and the Southern Kingdom (composed of Judah and two other tribes more or less). The tribes of the Northern Kingdom never did come back to YHVH or his Torah, but continued to walk in the ways of the heathen nations around them. As punishment for their disobedience and rebellion against him, YHVH allowed the very nations whom the Northern Kingdom “fell in love with” other than YHVH to take them captive. This resulted in the Israelite dispersion among the nations of the world as Moses predicted would happen in the Torah. Sadly, the same thing eventually happened to the Jews of the Southern Kingdom. Even though the Torah predicted this would occur (Gen 49:16; Deut 28:64; 29:25–28; 30:1–5; 32:21–29), it also predicted that YHVH would regather his people from the lands where they had been scattered (Deut 30:1–5). The Hebrew prophets spoke extensively about the exile and eventual return of all the tribes to the land of Israel. Often these prophecies were coupled with end time, Messianic and millennial prophecies. The prophecies about the return of the Israelites to their land was partially fulfilled by the return of a small remnant of Jews and Levites to the Israel during the time of Cyrus, king of Persia and Babylon. But this historical event didn’t fulfill these prophecies totally even in the least. First, Ezra makes it clear that only those from the tribes of Judah and Levi returned to Israel after the Jews’ seventy-year exile in Babylon. None from the Northern Kingdom returned. Second, the Jews only came from one nation of exile (Babylon), and not from many nations around the world — including even the furthest islands — as the Hebrew prophets predicted would happen. So the remnant of Jews who returned to Israel from Babylon was only a partial fulfillment of the biblical prophecies about all twelve tribes eventually returning to the land of Israel. Why did YHVH allow a remnant of Jews to return to Israel? Simply this. Had there been no Jews in the land of Israel, the Messiah couldn’t have been born in Bethlehem. With no Messiah, then the Messianic biblical prophecies couldn’t have been fulfilled making the Bible — the Word of Elohim — a lie. Not only that, as we shall see below, it was the purpose of the Messiah to regather the lost sheep of the house of Israel by sending out spiritual fishermen with the good news message of redemption and salvation for all those who would repent of sin (i.e., Toarhlessness, see 1 John 3:4) and place their faith in the Yeshua, the Jewish Messiah. As we shall also discuss below, the apostolic writers of the Testimony of Yeshua (the New Testament) were very well aware that the twelve tribes were still extant in their day, and the gospel message needed to be taken to them. Not only that, but in Paul’s mind, the Gentiles were, at least in part, to be viewed as the lost the sheep of the house of Israel (i.e., the Northern Kingdom). The gospel message was to be like a net to draw them back into the spiritual fold of nation Israel — back into a spiritual relationship with YHVH Elohim through Yeshua the Messiah. Paul makes this clear in several places (especially in Eph 2:11–19). What the Jewish Sages Say For several millennia, many notable Jewish scholars have been aware of the biblical prophecies pertaining to the return of the Israelite exiles (all twelve tribes) from the lands where they were scattered. Even today, Orthodox Jews still pray daily for and look forward to the regathering of the dispersed of Israel from the four corners of the earth. They see this as something to be fulfilled in the end times with the advent of the Messiah. They refer to this event as the final redemption. Here are some quotes from some of these Jewish sages: The late Menachem Schneerson, the head of the Orthodox Jewish Lubivicher Movement, stated that,

The future King Messiah (Messiah Ben [Son of] David) will not only redeem the Jews from exile, but will restore the observance of the Torah-commandments to its complete state, which will only be possible when the Israelites are living in the land of Israel.

At this same time, according Schneerson while referencing the notable rabbinic sage of the Middle Ages, Moses Maimonides also known as the Rambam, Continue reading →