brahmin wrote:ok tyvm.
it may not be the most detailed discussion but i also enjoyed it.
a few more questions, if your patience holds -
- issac was actually Itzhak in hebrew, isnt it? and Yaakov is english-ified to Jacob?
phew.
will be a great help if you will answer those.
Okay
The pronunciation from the Hebrew would go:
Avraham; Yitzach; Yaakov.
But in the Torah it would include Avinu which means Father.
So, it's Avraham Avinu; Yitzach Avinu; Yaakov Avinu.
Then you've got Yaakov's name changing to Yisroel (Israel).
Yaakov's son that went down to Egypt - Yosef HaTzaddik (Joseph, the Righteous One).
Yishmael is Avraham's son by Hagar.
Esav is Yaakov's twin brother from Yitzach.
Quote:- who then are the original people of canaan? this is a very important question. i mean when they (jews) were led back to canaan from egypt - who, if any at all, was occupying the land of canaan? nobody? or the canaanites? are palestineans the descendants of canaanites? or descendants of someone else?
According the the Torah and somewhat corroborated by other histories (Babylonian; Egyptian; Phoenecian; and Greek), the original inhabitants of Canaan were separate tribal peoples similiar in all ways to other regions of the world, where individual tribes had their own customs and gods. Some of the names were Amorites; Jebusites; Hittites; Girgashites; Hevites; Perrizites; Amalekites; Moabites... and more.
Some of these tribes, Amalek, Moab, and Amor were all considered to be related to the Israelites.
The Phillistines showed up later on the scene, after Israel had already started to conquer Canaan. They were a warrior peoples with iron weapons and chariots that came from the north (Lebanon? Iraq?) They occupied the coastal regions and largely drove the Israelites back into what is the central hill country and Jordan river valley.
The Arabs currently called Palestinians are descended from everyone over the polyglot 3,000 years we are discussing.
Most of the present day Arabs called Palestinians are descended from Arabs that moved into that area of the Ottoman Empire and later the Palestinian mandate because Jews started moving into the area in the late 1800's and provided work and a viable economy.
The people that lived their for the last 3,000 years or so are descended from everybody that lived there, which includes the Canannites; the Israelites; the Jews; the Assyrians; the Babylonians; the Greeks; the Romans; the Persians; the Byzantine Romans; the Arab Muslims; and the European Crusaders.
From the time the Romans obliterated Israel up until the 20th century, the whole region was considered a desert wasteland where nothing grew and no economy flourished.
Quote:- in the approx 400 year time between abraham's son itzhak being born and moses getting the torah.... the hebrew's didnt have a religion isnt it? they were simply known as hebrews and judaism was born with moses's getting the torah (well the first 5 chapters of it). or am i wrong and jews/judaism is considered to have started from the time sarai gave birth.
It is given over in the Torah that Avraham Avinu was the first man to understand that G-d was One; that there was a supreme Creator that was not a material entity.
He made converts to this religion, but it didn't really take. He turned passed on this religion to his son, Yitzach Avinu who in turn passed it on to Yaakov Avinu who passed it on to his sons - the twelve tribes of Israel.
Judaism is considered to have begun when Avraham realized that G-d was G-d.
Quote:- i understand that abraham was the leader of the hebrew tribe. are there two kinds of jews - those who are the blood descendants of itzhak AND those who are the descendants of the rest of the tribe abraham headed? or are the descendants of the rest of the tribe not considered jews (we assume here an ideal case that jews never married a non jew and therefore negate the third kind - the people who are of mixed lineage)
According to the Torah:
Avraham had Yismael from Hagar.
Then he had Yitzach from Sarah.
G-d told Avraham that Yitzach from Sarah, his wife, would inherit and that Yishmael would not. But it was promised that Yishmael would also become a great nation.
In turn Yitzach had two sons, Esav and Yaakov.
Esav sold his birthright to Yaakov and Yaakov inherited the mantle of Judaism. Esav also became the father of nations and, according to the Torah, Rome comes from Esav.
Then Yaakov had twelve sons who became the twelve tribes of Israel.
The descendants of Yismael and Esav are not considered Jews.
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