1. Where is Israel?⤒🔗

Where is Israel? In our century this question has been asked and answered in various ways. The British-Israel movement was at one time well known and many people immersed themselves in speculations about possible connections between the ten lost tribes and the inhabitants of Great Britain, including also the family of David and the British monarchy. The lesser known, but still existing Netherlands-Israel movement specializes in making connections between the tribe of Naphtali, living along the coast, and the Dutch people. These are attempts to search for the vanished people of Israel.

In the last decades however the scope of the search has moved entirely in the direction of the descendants of the kingdom of the two tribes. The Zionist movement within the Jewish population was able to found a Jewish state in Palestine. It carries the name of Israel and it appears that now we can again point to a way to track the dispersed and where to find them. Within Christianity it led to a renewed contemplation on the question of where Israel was to be found: with the Jews as a race, or with the Christian church in which all people, inclusive of Jews, are being united? No one denies the existence of the state of Israel, but does this state indeed provide us with the right track to find Israel, with a right to live under this name on this earth?

Where is Israel? Is it hidden somehow in Great Britain, has it landed via a metamorphosis in the Christian church, or is it back in Palestine?

Besides these possibilities there is as yet another perspective with which we can approach our question: Inasmuch as it can be found back as a people Israel lives under great oppression, and the fact that some of them now live in a geographical nation-state does not change the situation much. This nation-state of Israel shares also in this oppression of the people, as becomes apparent continually.

2. The dispersed nation←⤒🔗

Throughout the centuries the trademark of Israel was the wandering Jew. This logo has not faded as much when we remind ourselves of the fact that most of the Jews live all over the world, dispersed in many continents, and that they are not intending or do not have the opportunity to return to the land of the judges and the kings.

What is the interpretation that we should give to this wandering of the Jews under continuous oppression? Various approaches of this phenomenon have been proposed.

2.1 Blood vengeance?←↰⤒🔗

Often people point to a form of blood vengeance as the background for the centuries-long oppression of the Jewish people. Didn’t the Jews invite it themselves: “His blood be upon us and our children”? Didn’t they in this way bring on themselves the doom of having to wander endlessly and forever?

There are a number of arguments that counter this widely held view, which has caused much grief:

1. The expression of the Jews on Good Friday is an unreasonable and improper manifestation, which can hardly function as an independent base for God’s actions.
2. After Easter the offer of grace goes forth in an undiminished way to Israel and to its leaders as well (Acts 2).
3. It is precisely the unbelieving rulers who suggest that the apostles want to avenge themselves with the gospel (Acts 5:28) while in fact the opposite is the case (Acts 5:31).
4. In the New Testament the responsibility for Jesus’ crucifixion is not extended to others but only to the leaders in Jerusalem: other Jews (for example, in the diaspora) are not held accountable for this action (Acts 13:27-29); 1 Thessalonians 2:14-15).
5. When the apostles leave the synagogues this happens in reaction to the rejection of the gospel, but not on account of the killing of Jesus in Jerusalem.
6. Nowhere in the New Testament do we find a distinction between judgments over the nations and more specific judgments over the Jewish people.
7. The people of Jerusalem acted in ignorance when they imagined that they could crucify Jesus and that for them particularly no blood would be flowing from it. Therefore they were not pinned down on their expression (see Acts 3, 13, 17).

2.2 Covenant vengeance?←↰⤒🔗

It was especially Dr. C. VanderWaal who strongly pointed to the view of a definite covenant vengeance and a closure of the old covenant. In his view, in 70 A.D. the Son of Man would have ‘come’ to seal his covenant wrath. Starting from this year the Jewish people are again on the same level as other peoples and there is no longer any difference between the Chinese, the Namibian, or the Jewish people.

Against this point of view it can be alleged that the apostle Paul, decades before 70 A.D., speaks of ‘the full wrath’. He writes about this in 1 Thessalonians 2:16c, “But wrath has come upon them at last!” This passage however does not deal with the fall of Jerusalem but with the unbelief among the people of Israel: the hardening in the initial unbelief is the punishment of God’s wrath. He gives these unwilling people up to what they are choosing for themselves. The apostle speaks in a similar vein about God’s anger in regard to humanity as a whole (Romans 1:18-32). That wrath also becomes tangible in the fact that God ‘gives the people over’ to their own ways, and he gives them up to a debased mind. The worst kind of wrath is that God lets them go into their own perdition. This wrath manifests itself in the unbelief of (a part of) the Jews and not about the people as such.

For the point of view of a rejection as a people, it is not possible either to make an appeal to the end of Jesus’ discourse to the scribes and the Pharisees: “See, your house is left to you desolate” (Matthew 23:38). This saying is directed to Jesus’ opponents within the Jewish people: from hereon in they have to look after their own house, the part of Israel that continues to stay connected with them. As religious leaders they miss out on Christ and the blessing and the support of the LORD. In this way, their house or family is left ‘empty’ and ‘deserted.’ The Greek word erèmos not only carries the meaning of ‘destroyed,’ but also of ‘empty’, ‘desolate’, ‘abandoned.’ The expression of ‘left you desolate’ makes us think of desertion and not of destruction. What is destroyed is no longer there, but in Matthew 23:38 Christ speaks of a house that remains, albeit empty and without Jesus. He is looking for his own people (from Jews and Gentiles), from which the unbelieving leaders will be excluded. What they desire, in other words, an Israel without Jesus, becomes the punishment for the unbelievers: their house becomes a Father-less house.

2.3 Disinheritance?←↰⤒🔗

Many regard the church, composed of the Jews and the Gentiles, as the replacement of the people of Israel: because the Gentiles have now become co-heirs when they believe in Jesus Christ, the Jewish nation would in fact have been disinherited. There is no longer room for unbelieving Jews: they are disinherited and as such there has not been left to them a legitimate place on earth, even though a good Christian will always make room for this ‘sojourner who lives in our towns.’

The special attention for the people of Israel that we encounter in the New Testament pleads against this consequence. In Romans 9-11, we do not read only about the intercession for this people, but also about the certainty that this hardening is only partial and will only be present as a partial reality in the future (Romans 9:1-5; 11:25-32). It is also made clear that the Gentiles are being incorporated into the believing Israel and not the other way around (Romans 11:11-24)! As well, in Romans 15:27, speaking about the collection for the Christians in Jerusalem, Paul says that the Gentiles have come to share in their spiritual blessings! In Revelation 7 the redeemed appear to be counted with the measure of the tribes of Israel: the thousand-fold expansion of God’s people is leading up to the 144,000: an Israel squared! The elect people prove to be a macro-Israel.

In their support of the idea of the disinheritance, people often point to the conclusion of the parable of the unrighteous tenants. We read in Matthew 21:43-44 the following words of the Saviour: “Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits. And the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him.”

These threatening words are directed to the chief priests and the elders (verse 23) and the Pharisees too know themselves rightfully addressed (verse 45; also implied by. 12:14; 19:3; 22:15). This last warning holds true for all who are involved in the plot against Jesus (21:38-41): “The kingdom of God will be taken away from you...” God will exclude them. Does this imply that the kingdom is also taken away from a people? And does this then imply the rejection of the Jewish people in favour of the new people of God from both Jews and Gentiles, as many commentators allege? The context would oppose this view, where it deals with the matter of a contrast within the Jewish people, between the leaders and the crowds (see Matthew 21:26-46), between the unwilling son and the repentant son (21:31-32). When implicitly a rejection of the Jewish people was intended, it would need to have stated ‘to peoples’ (plural). However, in Jesus’ formulation he does not put the one nation opposite the many other nations, but two kinds of people are being contrasted. On the one hand there are the Jewish people with its leaders who will kill Jesus. On the other hand there is within this people ‘a people’ that brings forth the fruits of the kingdom. Those are the people who will inherit (Matthew 5:5). There is a dividing line that runs through Israel, as has been stated by (among others) Mussner and Weren. The people who follow these leaders will perish, but the people who follow Jesus will be saved (see. also Snodgrass). There are two peoples within Israel (cf. Romans 9). Jesus’ way of speaking in this matter connects closely to the message of John the Baptist. He too had warned the people who appealed to their descent of Abraham, “God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham” (Matt. 3:9)! This becomes clear also when unwilling fellow citizens (tax collectors and prostitutes) become believing people in Jesus.

When Jesus still uses the word ‘people’ for this portion, it indicates how the true rights of the people rests with the Israel that follows the one who was rejected. That is not just a remnant, but they are the real people. After all, the people of God are not being constituted by natural descent but they are indicated in a qualitative manner: ‘all who bear the fruit of the kingdom’ through repentance and faith. Here Jesus’ words are not marked by any anti-Jewish thinking (as suggested by the Jewish New Testament scholar D. Flusser) whereby the Gentiles are supplanting the Jewish people, but it does indicate that the Jews will be saved not by their nationality but through faith in Abraham’s son.

Our conclusion needs to be the following: the dispersion of Israel cannot be explained from the point of blood vengeance, covenant vengeance, or disinheritance.

3. People in the waiting room?←⤒🔗

A more positive point of view is found with those who regard the wandering and the oppression of the Jewish people as an interim situation. This will result in a renewed institution of a state and will possibly also lead to conversion of the people. They point to Romans 11:26a: - “And in this way all Israel will be saved,” - or Matthew 23:29 - “...until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’” The strongest argument is sought with a literal and so-called non-spiritualized explanation of the prophecies in the Old Testament: won’t the people yet return and dwell safely within the walls of Jerusalem? In this way a duality is created between the people of Abraham with prophetic promises, and the believers from the Gentiles who are called in this interim period in order to enrich later the existence of the people of Israel as those who will enter. It is not especially the Christian who ultimately becomes ‘the sojourner who dwells in their towns.’

Against this view the following objections can be raised:

1. The New Testament does full justice to the Christians from the Gentiles as Abraham’s children: they are citizens in full rights of the Israel of God.
2. The prophecy speaks of a Remnant, a spiritual Israel, and not about the people as such. Not the bloodline is conclusive, but the repentance that God gives.
3. The land of Canaan, and living there, was a foreshadowing of a higher reality. The intended Jerusalem is the heavenly city (Galatians 4; Philippians 3; Revelation 21-22).
4. As a point of orientation, the temple is taken away. (Also the modern state of Israel is without a temple and misses the heart of its worship!) Mark 13 states that the Son of Man is coming from the heavenly sanctuary.
5. Matthew 2 shows that the exodus (from Egypt), the people (the son) and the land (Israel) are only accessible and safeguarded in Christ.

In conclusion: the dispersion is not an interim situation that will be dissolved to make room for a national restoration and a return to Old Testament relationships.

The Bible, through prophecy, does shed a certain light on this dispersion. That is the subject of this second part of the article.

4. The great oppression as fulfillment of prophecy←⤒🔗

It was the prophet Daniel to whom the LORD gave a detailed report about the future of the people of Israel. In Daniel 10-12 we can follow the tracks through the time of the Ptolemies and Seleucids, but also past this until after the time of the Maccabean struggle for freedom and the arrival of the Romans. Then we read in Daniel 12:1, “And there shall be a time of trouble, such as never has been since there was a nation till that time. But at that time your people shall be delivered, everyone whose name shall be found written in the book.”

In his discourse about the destruction of the temple, Jesus goes back to this prophecy: he announces that it will become effective from the time the temple is destroyed. Precisely because a time of persecution will precede the end, the destruction of the temple must be understood as a signal of the great tribulation that will come upon Israel (Mark 13:14f). When the temple falls it is time to flee. You need to prepare yourself for the greatest tribulation of all times. Because in those days of oppression God will shorten the days of trouble, a Jewish people will yet remain. From them God wants to gather his chosen ones. Within this same people, however, also false christs and false prophets will arise, in order to –if at all possible– pull people away from Christ through their signs. People are warned beforehand. Matthew, who wrote primarily to the Jews, reported these warnings of Jesus in greater detail (Matthew 24:26-28). For example, Jesus warned the people not to believe it when some people announce the coming of the Messiah, either out in the desert or in the inner rooms. We can think here of Zionistic activities under the direction of freedom fighters who gather the people behind them in the desert (guerilla commanders), or of mystic leaders who promise the presence of the Messiah in apocalyptical visions and the mystic contemplation of the inner room. The coming of Jesus Christ cannot be announced, cannot be anticipated or calculated and needs no proclamation: it will be evident to all at that moment, like lightning that lights up the skies.

In this connection Jesus also spoke the puzzling saying that Matthew recorded: “Wherever the corpse is, there the vultures will gather” (Matt. 24:28). Within the context this saying points to the desperation of premature and illegal gathering together. The many who let themselves be gathered in the desert for a messianic war of liberation and the many who seek their salvation in the mystical way to God resemble the vultures: birds that gather around their prey. Those who expect the Living One will patiently continue to wait until he will irresistibly reappear.

The image of the vultures is, through the close connection with verse 27, involved indeed in the coming of Christ: as the carcass presents itself to the vultures, so also will be his appearance to the people (see Calvin). The shocking image (the Living One compared to a dead carcass?) then often leads to a special application of the judgment: as vultures know how to find their prey so Christ and his angels will bring judgment on all unrighteousness (e.g., Zahn). The connection to verse 27 however becomes less strong and Zahn would have to typify verses 26-28 as an insertion by Matthew, because in verse 29 it goes back again to the time shortly before the judgment. This problem however is avoided when the saying about the vultures is connected to verse 26 and taken as a contrast with verse 27. Grosheide seeks it in this direction (i.e., the false christs coming to the churches). However, the congregation can hardly be compared to prey, and in addition the false christs pull the congregations behind them. It receives recommendation therefore to identify the prey with these false christs and false prophets. With them the vultures (who love carcasses) are gathered (in the desert or in the inner rooms) but the Living One will make his appearance to the whole world all at once. Whereas verse 28 speaks again, just like verse 26, about the time of misleading that precedes Christ’s coming, there is a proper connection with verse 29 (“...immediately after the tribulation of those days...”).

Immediately after the great tribulation the Son of Man will come in a way that will cause the entire cosmos to shake (Matt. 24:29-31). At that time his enemies will mourn, but the righteous will be gathered from the great diaspora. Then the great tribulation for Israel will come to a definite end!

Conclusion: the appearance of the wandering nation must not be understood as a judgment, and neither as a blessing that is being prepared. It is the prerequisite for learning to look up to heaven and the possibility of realization of unbelief and false prophecy.

5. The significance of the oppression for the church←⤒🔗

Because unbelievers from the peoples are being incorporated into Israel, the church shares in the circumstances of this people. We can indeed join the true people of Abraham, yet for us there is as yet no land and no nation. We become aliens and sojourners, living in the diaspora together with the Christians from among the Jews who share in the affairs of the Jewish people. As Christians coming from the Gentiles, we cannot come to the inner court or come together under the banner of King Jesus in Jerusalem. We have no city on this earth! All too often the church has attempted to found its own state or papacy. This has failed however, and that belongs to our time. But when the innumerable multitude will stand before the throne it appears to have come in its entirety, i.e., from all nations, out of the great tribulation (Revelation 7:14).

The ‘fleeing to the mountains’ indicates a direction for the Jewish Christians, and so indirectly also for the Gentile-Christians who may be joining them. Now is not the time to look for restoration. This implies also that a state, founded in unbelief, does not constitute a special factor for Christians, and certainly not in missionary work.

A big question mark can be placed here with the following sentence, quoted from a pamphlet that promotes this preaching of the gospel in the state of Israel: “In the creation of the state of Israel with a concentrated Jewish settlement, does God not give a special opportunity to direct the preaching of the Gospel to the Jews living there?” In light of Daniel 12 and Mark 13 the formation of the state of Israel is to be regarded as an act of hardening, and Christians will do well to keep to the command ‘Flee to the mountains’ and when someone says ‘Here is the Christ’ or ‘there he is’ do not follow him. In my opinion, and also to protect our task to do mission work among the Muslims, with mission to the Jews we need to keep our distance from the state of Israel and rather direct this work toward the Jews who live near us, in the diaspora which Christ prophesied, in order to comfort them with the heavenly Jerusalem that is descending without injustice toward the Palestinians.

The end of the dispersion for all believers in Christ (first the Jew and then also the Greek [or: Gentile]) will be reached when Christ returns and gathers us in the Jerusalem that is descending from heaven, where the names of the 12 patriarchs besides those of the 12 apostles (24 Jews) will have positional significance: Abraham’s people finally at home on earth! Israel has not vanished, even though it wandered about under great oppression. The elect are sealed and together with the Christians from the Gentiles it even appears to be a very numerous people: the 12² x 1,000 in Revelation 7:4).

The fact that Israel is not lost without a trace, also not on the last day, becomes clear from the words about the restoration or regeneration of the people.

It is especially Matthew, the preacher of the gospel among the Jews, who has recorded an element of Jesus’ teaching that is not found with any of the other evangelists, and which connects to the people as such. It is found in Matthew 19:28. In his answer about the reward for following him Jesus said, “Truly [Amen], I say to you, in the new world [in Greek: in the regeneration], when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.” In the reward of the disciples it is not only about their individual wages. They were called to perform a task. Their number of twelve reminded them of their destiny for the twelve tribes. This work does not appear to be all that fruitful: the movement of Jesus with the twelve disciples bypasses the leaders of the people. Seated as judges, the members of the Sanhedrin turn against the Master. In the same way his followers share in the condemnation by the leaders. The resulting poverty and sacrifice will however be changed, not just for them only but for the entire people, into richness and majesty. Adams’s great Son (according to the promises of Daniel 7) will reign and exercise his rule over God’s works. That is the time of the Restoration, i.e., the regeneration.

Matthew used the word palinggenesia (regeneration). In the New Testament there is only one other instance where this word is used, in Titus 3:5. There it deals with the individual rebirth of people. In Matthew 19:28 it relates to the restoration of people and of the world. This is also how the Jewish historian Josephus used this word for the restoration of the home country after the exile (Antiquities 11; 66).

Jesus’ poverty, which scared off the rich young man, is the way of the Son of Adam, who redeems and restores the world. Therefore the followers, who are now sharing in this poverty, will later be the leaders in Israel. The ‘judging of the tribes’ indicates ruling and administering justice. This implies that the attitude about Christ will become very decisive for Israel, for whether they will share in the time of the Restoration, or miss out on this.

The establishment of the state of Israel is not a creation of Jesus Christ with his twelve apostles (from the Jews!). It is a misleading concept of an anti-Christian movement among the Jewish people. The great restoration out of the tribulation will come suddenly when the Son of Man will reappear on the clouds of heaven. And this restoration will show that the new earth will not be populated by Abraham’s race, but instead it will be filled through the faith of Abraham, under the eternal leadership of a Jewish king from Nazareth, surrounded by twelve Jewish judges who are called apostles.

6. Conclusions←⤒🔗

1. No single person and also no single people has special rights before God outside of Jesus Christ. Even the people of Abraham receive God’s blessing, the exodus, the land and their future only through the son of Mary. He is the only way!
2. The Christ is born within the people of Abraham, as the Immanuel in David’s house. He will fulfill the promise that in Abraham’s seed all peoples will be blessed. Salvation really will come from Zion!
3. Christ has made it clear to the Jews that they will be excluded when they reject him. But he has also made clear that he will gather a people with the apostles at the core, a people that will produce fruit and where the Gentiles join in.
4. This new people does not supersede Israel, but it is Israel because the Messiah and the leaders (the judging apostles) are Jews. With them the Restoration (the rebirth or resurrection) of Abraham’s people will be realized. Then the twelve will also judge the people – and the peoples.
5. In the time between Christ’s suffering and his appearance in glory, the temple as religious centre will be taken away. The Jewish people will share in the great tribulation as announced in and through Daniel. Many among the people will believe, but also many false prophets and messiahs will arise.
6. Upon his return Christ will make an end to the tribulation of the Jewish people and will separate the sheep from the goats. Then it will also become apparent that the believers have experienced a great growth in the meantime from the Gentiles, who will enter the festive room together with them and together they will inherit the land (the earth).
7. The fact that Israel as people has not disappeared from view in the New Covenant does not have its own meaning: as if it would appear that God grants this nation (independent of faith in him) certain significance for the world. This fact of Israel’s continuation as a people in the face of much oppression and torn apart because of much unbelief does however, in light of prophecy, get confirming significance through the prophecy and the gospel, in which this future has already been foretold.
8. It is incorrect to attach special significance to the recently reinstituted Jewish state in Palestine for the faith or the position of Christians, because its presence does not take away anything from the main line of the great tribulation. It can be characterized rather as an expression of being a false messiah-ship, something Jesus warned us about.
9. There is no special calling for mission among the Jews, even when there is the promise that a remnant from the Jews will escape the hardening of hearts. Because the Jews experience, correctly or incorrectly, that their oppression has been caused especially by the Christian world, for many of them there will not be an open door to receive the gospel. Prayers for open doors may not lead to forcing the situation. Those Jews who do confess Christ in this world deserve special support in their task in regard to their fellow people.