The Tribes

Hosea 13:15 NLT

Genesis 49:1-28

Genesis 48:5 ESV

Many of us might not inherently understand the depth of the twelve tribes of Israel found in Genesis 49:1-28.

We remember the twelve tribes are the twelve sons of Jacob:  Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun, Joseph, and Benjamin. Ephraim and Manasseh were the sons of Joseph.

Ephraim was noted because the two of Joseph’s sons were given their own portion of land. We know from Genesis 48:5, “And now your two sons, who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt, are mine; Ephraim and Manasseh shall be mine, as Reuben and Simeon are.”

The large tribe of Ephraim was the most prominent tribes in the northern kingdom.

That helps us to understand why the prophet noted Ephraim in Hosea 13:15, “Ephraim was the most fruitful of all his brothers, but the east wind—a blast from the LORD— will arise in the desert. All their flowing springs will run dry, and all their wells will disappear. Every precious thing they own will be plundered and carried away.”

The tribe of a Ephraim was the dominant and driving force in the Northern Kingdom.

The twelve tribes were formed for numerous reasons. It make sense because of division of land. It was God’s means of providing national identity for His chosen people.

The tribe of Ephraim was named in Hosea to highlight the political history of Ephraim, grandson of Jacob. The Tribe of Ephraim was the driving force in the Northern Kingdom.

At the time of Hosea he was reminding Israel they were established by God to be a patriarchal society but they had become fractured as a people. Hosea lived in the mid to late 8th Century, B.C.E. He was specifically a prophet to the Northern Kingdom.

The Northern Kingdom fell to the Assyrians in 722-720 B.C.

Israel had been warned. In Deuteronomy 28:62-63 we are told, “You who were as numerous as the stars in the sky will be left but few in number, because you did not obey the Lord your God. Just as it pleased the Lord to make you prosper and increase in number, so it will please him to ruin and destroy you. You will be uprooted from the land you are entering to possess.”

The warning was clear, but Israel did not heed the warning. In 2 Kings 17:15 we read, “They despised his statutes and his covenant that he made with their fathers and the warnings that he gave them. They went after false idols and became false, and they followed the nations that were around them, concerning whom the Lord had commanded them that they should not do like them.”

Basically, they intentionally did everything they knew they should not do.

It’s one thing to forget or unintentionally do something wrong.

It’s quite another to intentionally ignore God’s command.

At this point, the choice made was intentional.

Deborah

acrazyjourney.com