1. Settlement of Israel in Canaan.—Of the twelve tribes of Israel, nine and a half were located to the west and two and a half to the east of the Jordan. In this region they had been led by Joshua, Moses being only permitted to catch a distant glimpse of the promised land. After the death of Joshua, followed the period of Judges, which lasted about five centuries. The last of the judges was Samuel, who, when the people demanded a king, anointed Saul, 1095, B.C.—Anderson's Gen. Hist.
2. The Departure of the Ten Tribes for the North—They [the ten tribes] determined to go to a country "where never man dwelt," that they might be free from all contaminating influences. That country could only be found in the north. Asia was already the seat of a comparatively ancient civilizations; Egypt flourished in northern Africa; and southern Europe was rapidly filling with the future rulers of the world. They had, therefore, no choice but to turn their faces northward. The first portion of their journey was not, however, north; according to the account of Esdras, they appear to have at first moved in the direction of their old home, and it is possible that they originally started with the intention of returning thereto, or probably in order to deceive the Assyrians, they started as if to return to Canaan, and when they crossed the Euphrates, and were out of danger from the hosts of the Medes and Persians, then they turned their journeying feet toward the polar star. Esdras states that they entered in at the narrow passage of the river Euphrates, the Lord staying the springs of the flood until they were passed over. The point on the river Euphrates at which they crossed would necessarily be in its upper portion, as lower down would be too far south for their purpose. The upper course of the Euphrates lies among lofty mountains near the village of Pastas; it plunges through a gorge formed by precipices more than a thousand feet in height and so narrow that it is bridged at the top; it shortly afterwards enters the plain of Mesopotamia. How accurately this portion of the river answers to the description of Esdras of the "Narrows," where the Israelites crossed!—Reynolds' Are we of Israel? pp. 26-27.
3. Final Overthrow of Judah.—According to Josephus (De Bell. Jud. vi: 9, 3) 1,100,000 men fell in the siege of Jerusalem by Titus, and 79,000 were captured in the whole war. Of the latter number, the greater part was distributed among the provinces, to be butchered in the amphitheaters or cast to wild beasts; others were doomed to work as public slaves in Egypt; only those under the ages of seventeen were sold into private bondage. An equally dreadful destruction fell upon the remains of the nation, which had once more assembled in Judea, under the reign of Hadrian (A. D. 133), which Dion Cassius concisely relates. By these two savage wars the Jewish population must have been effectually extirpated from the Holy Land itself, a result which did not follow from the Babylonian captivity. Afterwards a dreary period of fifteen hundred years' oppression crushed in Europe all who bore the name of Israel, and Christian nations have visited on their head a crime [the crucifixion of Messiah] perpetrated by a few thousand inhabitants of Jerusalem, who were not the real forefathers of the European Jews. Nor in the east has their lot been much more cheering. With a few partial exceptions, they have ever since been a despised, an oppressed and naturally a degraded people; though from them have spread light and truth to the distant nations of the earth.—Biblical Literature (Kitto) vol. I, p. 39.
4. Return of the Ten Tribes from the North.—Away in yonder north countries, where, I do not know, but away in those regions are ten tribes of the house of Israel. How do you know they are in the north country? Because the Bible has told us that in the latter days they should come out of the north country, and if they were not in the north country they could not come from there. Jeremiah says in his thirty-first chapter—"Behold I will bring them from the north, the blind and the lame with them, and the woman with child; they shall come, a great company out of the north countries." Where will they go to? Will they go immediately to Palestine, where they formerly had their inheritance. No. Jeremiah tells us where they will go, he tells there is to be a place called Zion before these tribes come out of the north countries, and when they come with a great company, the blind and the lame with them, and the Lord God leads them with supplication and with tears and with prayers, bringing them forth from those dreary, desolate, cold arctic regions; when that day shall come, there shall be a Zion prepared to receive these ten tribes, before they finally go back to Palestine. Is there anything in the scriptures about this? Yes. In the same chapter of Jeremiah we read that, "they shall come and sing in the height of Zion." Zion, then, will have to be built up before they come; Zion will have to be reared somewhere and prepared to receive them; and it will be a holy place, and it will be a holy people who will build up Zion, so much so that the Lord will bring these ten tribes into the height of Zion, into the midst of it.—Orson Pratt—Journal of Discourses, vol. 18, p. 22, 23.
5. All Nations Flowing Unto the House of the Lord.—One of the features in the celebration of Pioneer Day—24th of July, the anniversary of the day the company of Pioneers entered Salt Lake Valley, 1847—in Salt Lake City, 1880, was to have represented the various nationalities composing the population of Utah. A man and a woman of each nation from which people had been gathered by the proclamation of the gospel were selected as the representatives, each pair bearing the national colors of their country. They occupied a platform in the Tabernacle during the services, and after a historical sketch of the introduction of the gospel in the various nations was read by Orson Pratt, the representatives of the nations arose and President John Taylor said: "I wish to state to the congregation that the Lord commanded his servants to go forth to all the world to preach the gospel to every creature. We have not yet been to all the world, but here are twenty-five nations represented today, and we have thus far fulfilled our mission."
6. The Latter-day Saints of Israel.—The set time was come for God to gather Israel, and for his work to commence upon the face of the whole earth, and the elders who have arisen in this church and kingdom are actually of Israel. Take the elders who are in the house [the old Tabernacle in Salt Lake City], and you can scarcely find one out of a hundred but what is of the house of Israel. * * * Will we go to the Gentile nations to preach the gospel? Yes, and gather out the Israelites wherever they are mixed among the nations of the earth. * * * Ephraim has become mixed with all the nations of the earth, and it is Ephraim that is gathering together. It is Ephraim that I have been searching for all the days of my preaching, and that is the blood which ran in my veins when I embraced the gospel. If there are any of the other tribes of Israel mixed with the Gentiles we are also searching after them.—Brigham Young. From a Discourse preached April 8th, 1855.
REVIEW.
1. What great work did the visit of Moses to the Kirtland Temple inaugurate?
2. Who are Israel?