Israel in the Bible, Israel Today, and God’s Promise to Abraham
Understanding the biblical person named Israel, the nation and tribe of Israel, the modern State of Israel, Palestine, and God’s promise to Abraham
The word Israel is used in several different ways, and confusion begins when those meanings are treated as though they are identical.
In the Bible, Israel can refer to Jacob, the descendants of Jacob, the twelve tribes, the united kingdom and later nation, the people of the covenant, and the Jewish people in relation to God’s promises. Today, Israel usually refers to the modern State of Israel, established in 1948.
That modern state is connected historically and culturally to the Jewish people and to the biblical land, but it is not simply identical with the covenant nation described in Scripture. Palestinians are a modern Arab people whose identity developed over many centuries. They should not simply be equated with the ancient Philistines.
Israel begins with Jacob
The biblical story of Israel begins with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God called Abram and promised, “I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing” (Genesis 12:2).
Abraham’s son was Isaac, and Isaac’s son was Jacob. Jacob had twelve sons, whose descendants became the twelve tribes of Israel. In Genesis, God gave Jacob a new name: “Your name shall no more be called Jacob, but Israel” (Genesis 32:28).
The name Israel is first the name of a person. It becomes the name of his descendants and the people formed through God’s covenant.
The twelve tribes of Israel
Jacob’s twelve sons became the fathers of the twelve tribes. They were Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun, Joseph, and Benjamin.
Joseph’s descendants were later represented through Ephraim and Manasseh, while Levi had a special priestly and liturgical role. The tribes were not merely political divisions. They represented a people bound together by ancestry, worship, covenant, law, and God’s promises.
What did God mean when He said, “I will make you a great nation”?
God’s promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:1–3 had several dimensions.
A great people
Abraham and Sarah were elderly and childless when God called them. The promise that Abraham would become the father of a great nation seemed humanly impossible. God fulfilled it through Isaac, Jacob, and the twelve tribes.
A covenant relationship
Israel was not merely a large ethnic group. Israel was called into a covenant relationship with God: “I will take you for my people, and I will be your God” (Exodus 6:7).
A people with a vocation
At Sinai, God said, “You shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:6). Israel was called to know God, worship Him, live according to His commandments, and bear witness to His holiness among the nations.
A source of blessing to the nations
The promise to Abraham was never only about his descendants receiving blessings. God said that through Abraham all the families of the earth would be blessed. Israel was chosen for the sake of God’s plan for the whole human family.
A promise fulfilled ultimately in Christ
The New Testament understands the promise to Abraham in relation to Jesus Christ. Saint Paul writes, “If you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise” (Galatians 3:29).
The Catholic Church sees Christ as the fulfillment of God’s universal promise. Through Jesus, the blessing given to Abraham extends to all nations. This does not erase the Jewish people from salvation history; it means that the promises reach their universal fulfillment in Christ.
Israel’s covenant at Sinai
After God delivered Israel from slavery in Egypt, He established the covenant at Mount Sinai. The Ten Commandments and the Law taught Israel how to live as God’s people.
God gave Israel freedom, His law, the priesthood, the tabernacle and Temple, the land promised to the patriarchs, the prophets, the royal line of David, and the hope of the Messiah.
But Israel was also expected to live in justice and holiness. The prophets repeatedly reminded the people that worship without righteousness was unacceptable: “Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression” (Isaiah 1:17).
Israel’s land in the Old Testament
God promised Abraham and his descendants a land: “To your descendants I give this land” (Genesis 15:18). The land became central to Israel’s identity.
However, the Old Testament does not present possession of the land as permission to abandon justice. The prophets warned that Israel could not appeal to the covenant while practicing idolatry, oppressing the poor, or violating God’s commandments. The land was a gift, but the gift came with a moral vocation.
The kingdom divides
After Solomon’s death, the united kingdom divided. The northern tribes formed the kingdom commonly called Israel, with Samaria as an important center. The southern kingdom was called Judah, with Jerusalem as its capital.
The northern kingdom was conquered by Assyria, and the southern kingdom was later conquered by Babylon. Jerusalem and the Temple were destroyed, and many people of Judah were taken into exile. Later, some returned and rebuilt the Temple.
These events shaped the biblical understanding of Israel. The people experienced both God’s faithfulness and the consequences of national sin.
Israel and Palestine in the Bible
The relationship between biblical Israel and the land later called Palestine is complicated and should not be reduced to modern political slogans.
The name Palestine
The word Palestine is related to the ancient Philistines, who lived along part of the southern coastal region of Canaan. The Roman administration later used the name Syria Palaestina for the region after the Jewish revolts of the second century AD.
The existence of the modern name Palestine does not mean that modern Palestinians are simply the same people as the ancient Philistines. Modern Palestinian identity developed through a long and complex history involving local populations, Arabs, immigration, and changing empires and political structures.
Biblical Israel and Canaan
The Old Testament calls the land by several names, including Canaan, the land of Israel, and the land of Judah. The biblical narrative records the presence of many peoples in the region, including Canaanites, Amorites, Philistines, Moabites, and Edomites.
The Bible is not a modern political map. It is a record of God’s covenant dealings with a people and a theological history of salvation.
The Palestinians are not simply ancient Philistines
Modern Palestinians are predominantly Arabic-speaking people, including Muslims and Christians. Their history is connected to the broader population of the region over many centuries.
It is historically inaccurate to treat all Palestinians as ancient Philistines or to claim that modern political identity can be read directly from one biblical ethnic group. Likewise, modern Israeli citizens are not all identical with the biblical tribes.
The modern State of Israel and 1948
The State of Israel was established on May 14, 1948, when David Ben-Gurion declared its establishment. It is inaccurate to say that the United States established Israel by itself.
The international background included the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the British Mandate for Palestine, modern Zionism, Jewish immigration, the Holocaust, the 1917 Balfour Declaration, the 1947 United Nations partition recommendation, and the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.
The United States recognized the new state de facto shortly after its declaration. The United Nations partition plan proposed separate Jewish and Arab states, with Jerusalem under a special international regime. War followed Israel’s declaration of independence.
The 1948 war resulted in the establishment of Israel and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, an event Palestinians call the Nakba, meaning “catastrophe.” The historical suffering of Jewish survivors and refugees does not erase the suffering of Palestinians. A morally serious account must acknowledge both.
The population of Israel today
Population figures change monthly, and definitions vary depending on whether a source counts citizens, residents, foreign workers, East Jerusalem, or territory beyond Israel’s internationally recognized boundaries.
The latest widely reported official population snapshot available for this article is approximately 10.1 million residents around Israel’s 2025 Independence Day. Because this article is being prepared in 2026, the exact current total should be checked against the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics before publication.
A broad breakdown was approximately:
- Jewish population: about 7.7 million, roughly 76–77%.
- Arab population: about 2.1 million, roughly 21%.
- Other residents and foreign nationals: about 250,000, roughly 2–3%.
The Arab population includes Muslims, Christians, Druze, and other communities. The Jewish population includes religious Jews, secular Jews, Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox communities, and people from many ethnic and cultural backgrounds.
The figures above generally refer to the population counted by Israeli authorities within the state’s administrative system. They should not be confused with the combined population of Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. The Palestinian population in the West Bank and Gaza is not included in Israel’s resident population total.
The population of Israel is not the same as the biblical nation
A modern population count cannot tell us whether a nation is faithful to God. Biblical Israel was a covenant people formed by God through Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, David, and the prophets. The modern State of Israel is a contemporary political state with citizens of various religions and levels of faith.
Modern Israel includes religious Jews, secular Jews, Muslim citizens, Christian citizens, Druze citizens, people with no religion, and foreign residents. It would be wrong to describe every Israeli citizen as personally responsible for the actions of the government, just as it would be wrong to describe every Palestinian as responsible for the actions of a political or militant organization.
How far off path is Israel from God’s intentions?
The Bible gives a clear description of God’s intentions for the descendants of Abraham: they were to worship God, live in covenant faithfulness, practice justice, care for the vulnerable, welcome the stranger, reject oppression, and become a blessing to the nations.
By those standards, no modern nation perfectly fulfills God’s intentions. Israel’s biblical history itself contains repeated failures, including idolatry, injustice, exploitation of the poor, corruption, violence, faithless leadership, and reliance on power instead of God.
Amos declared, “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” (Amos 5:24). Jeremiah warned that the covenant required justice and care for the alien, orphan, and widow (Jeremiah 7:5–7).
These standards apply to every nation, including Israel, the Palestinian leadership, the United States, and all other nations. No biblical promise gives any government permission to ignore the moral law.
The Bible’s concern for the stranger
One repeated command in the Law is care for the stranger: “You shall not oppress a stranger; you know the heart of a stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Exodus 23:9).
Israel was expected to remember its experience of slavery and displacement. That memory was meant to produce compassion, not indifference.
The Bible’s concern for justice
The prophets condemned leaders who used power unjustly. God’s people were expected to protect the weak, pay workers fairly, avoid corrupt courts, refuse bribes, care for widows and orphans, tell the truth, and pursue peace where possible.
These commands apply to Israeli leaders, Palestinian leaders, militant groups, foreign governments, religious communities, and individuals. No side can use the Bible to justify hatred or the dehumanization of another people.
Israel, the Church, and the Jewish people
The Catholic Church teaches that the relationship between Christianity and the Jewish people is unique. The Church cannot forget that Christianity’s roots are found in the faith of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, the prophets, and the people of Israel.
Saint Paul writes, “They are Israelites, and to them belong the sonship, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises” (Romans 9:4).
The Church rejects hatred of Jews and rejects the idea that Jewish people can be blamed collectively for the death of Jesus. At the same time, Catholic teaching does not equate the modern State of Israel with the biblical covenant in a way that exempts its government from moral evaluation.
The Church and the modern conflict
The Catholic Church supports the dignity and safety of both Israelis and Palestinians. Catholic teaching rejects antisemitism, anti-Arab racism, terrorism, attacks on civilians, hostage-taking, deliberate targeting of noncombatants, forced displacement, collective punishment, religious hatred, and indiscriminate violence.
A Christian cannot use the Bible to justify hatred of Jews or Palestinians. Scripture must lead to truth, justice, repentance, and prayer.
Is the modern State of Israel the fulfillment of biblical prophecy?
Some Christians argue that the modern State of Israel is a direct fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. Others interpret the biblical promises through Christ and the Church without treating the modern state as a direct prophetic fulfillment.
The Catholic Church does not teach that every modern political decision by Israel is divinely approved because the state exists in the biblical land. Nor does Catholic teaching require Christians to deny the historical connection between the Jewish people and the land.
A balanced Catholic approach recognizes the enduring importance of the biblical covenant, the unique relationship between the Church and the Jewish people, the Jewish people’s historical connection to the land, the rights and dignity of Palestinians, and the need for justice, security, peace, and equal human dignity.
What does it mean to be a blessing to the nations?
God told Abraham, “By you all the families of the earth shall bless themselves” (Genesis 12:3). To be a blessing is not merely to become powerful, wealthy, or militarily secure.
A biblical blessing includes knowing God, practicing justice, protecting the vulnerable, living truthfully, welcoming the stranger, teaching holiness, seeking peace, and serving others.
The descendants of Abraham were called to be a witness to God’s holiness. When they were faithful, they blessed others. When they were unjust, the prophets condemned them. The same principle applies to Christians.
A Catholic prayer for Israel, Palestine, and peace
Merciful God, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, look with compassion upon the people of Israel and Palestine.
Protect every innocent life. Comfort those who mourn. Heal those who are wounded. Bring home those who are held captive. Strengthen those who work for peace.
Deliver every community from hatred, vengeance, terrorism, racism, oppression, corruption, and despair.
Give wisdom to political leaders, courage to religious leaders, and compassion to every person who has suffered loss.
Help Jews, Christians, and Muslims honor the dignity of every human being and reject every ideology that treats another person as less than human.
Establish justice and lasting peace in the Holy Land. May Israelis and Palestinians live with security, freedom, dignity, and respect for the rights of others.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Conclusion
Israel in the Bible begins with a person: Jacob, whose name God changed to Israel. It then becomes the name of his descendants, the twelve tribes, the covenant people, and the nation formed through God’s promises to Abraham.
When God said, “I will make you a great nation,” He meant more than numerical growth or political power. Abraham’s descendants were called to belong to God, live in holiness, practice justice, and become a blessing to all nations.
The modern State of Israel was established in 1948 through a complex history involving Zionism, the Holocaust, the British Mandate, the United Nations partition proposal, Jewish independence, and war. It was not established by the United States alone, although the United States recognized it soon after its declaration.
The biblical Israel and modern Israel are related historically, but they are not identical in every theological or political sense. Modern Palestinians are not simply ancient Philistines, and modern Israeli citizens are not all identical with the biblical tribes.
The descendants of Abraham are called to be a blessing. That calling requires justice, mercy, truth, humility, protection of the innocent, and care for the stranger.
By those standards, every nation falls short, including Israel, Palestinian leadership, the United States, and all other nations. The Christian response is not hatred or political idolatry. It is truth, prayer, repentance, and a commitment to the dignity of every human person.