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The House of Israel, as a result of their idolatry, were then taken into captivity in Assyria as a punishment for their sins.According to the Bible, the House of Judah was made up of all the Jews that wanted to serve God, and the House of Israel was made up of the idolators.
But the House of Judah then also turned out to be idolatrous not very long afterwards. Note God's opinion about Judah as spoken through Jeremiah (3:6-11; 11:9-10).
Excerpt:
If there is one thing that is made abundantly clear by the Gospel narrative, it is this, that the influence of Jesus with the people was so great that the Sanhedrin did not dare to arrest him openly.
The triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem had placed the Jewish authorities in a very awkward predicament. If they arrested Jesus they would themselves be in danger from the mob; if, on the other hand, they failed to arrest him, the mob might rise against the Roman garrison and set Jesus up as King (Dan. 9:24). In either case there would be serious rioting, and for this the Roman governor would hold them responsible.
Faced with this dilemma, they decided that they must shelter themselves behind the power of Rome. If they could only arrest Jesus without danger to themselves, they would try him behind closed doors; they would then take him to Pilate, and say that they had found him guilty of heading an insurrection, and demand his immediate execution.
Note God's opinion about Judah as spoken through Jeremiah (3:6-11; 11:9-10) almost six hundred years previously, when the conspiracy of the Hidden Hand had first been revealed by God to Jeremiah; confirmed by Ezekiel (22:25) and which conspiracy was, six hundred years later, aimed against Jesus:-
Jeremiah 3:6 The "I AM" said also unto me in the days of Josiah the king, Hast thou seen [that] which backsliding Israel hath done? she is gone up upon every high mountain and under every green tree, and there hath played the harlot (been unfaithful to Me).
3:7 And I said after she had done all these [things], Turn thou unto Me. But she returned not. And her treacherous sister Judah saw [it].
3:8 And I saw, when for all the causes whereby backsliding Israel committed adultery I had put her away, and given her a bill of divorce; yet her treacherous sister Judah feared not, but went and played the harlot also.
3:9 And it came to pass through her making light of her whoredom, that she defiled the land, and committed adultery with stones and with stocks.
3:10 And yet for all this her treacherous sister Judah hath not turned unto Me with her whole heart, but in pretence, saith the "I AM" (Matt. 15:8).
3:11 And the "I AM" said unto me, The backsliding Israel hath justified herself more than treacherous Judah (Jew-dah).
11:9 And the "I AM" said unto me, A conspiracy is found among the men of Judah, and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
11:10 They are turned back to the inequities of their forefathers, which refused to hear My words; and they went after other gods to serve them: the House of Israel and the House of Judah have broken My Covenant which I made with their fathers.
Ezekiel 22:25 [There is] a conspiracy of her prophets in the midst thereof, like a roaring lion ravening the prey; they have devoured souls; they have taken the treasure and precious things; they have made her many widows in the midst thereof.
It was at this juncture that Judas went to the chief priests, and offered to show them how Jesus might be arrested in absolute secrecy. Needless to say, his offer was accepted. But the opportunity to put it into practice did not occur until the following Tuesday evening, which was the Feast of the Passover.
On that day Jesus ate the Passover with his disciples, and late in the evening went out of the city to a garden near the village of Gethsemane. In pitch-black darkness, broken only by the fitful light of lanterns and torches, Jesus was arrested by officers and men of the Temple Guard. This was in the very early hours of Wednesday morning (Dan. 9:26-27 - 21st of April in 34 AD). By nine o'clock the same morning he had been nailed to the cross, and by three o'clock in the afternoon he was dead.
The Jewish authorities, inspired by the infamous Hidden Hand, rejected Jesus, knowing full well that he claimed to be the Messiah, and that every circumstance of his life proved his claims to be true; and they laid themselves under an age-long curse, when they cried, 'His blood be on us, and on our children.'
He was rejected, as we have already seen, because he preached the restoration of the Kingdom of Israel, not to the Jews alone, but to all the seed of Jacob, for the benefit of all mankind. The real struggle had been between Jesus and the Hidden Hand, and the Hidden Hand thought they had triumphed.
But the crime of the Crucifixion was already working out the purposes of God. On the following Saturday (3 days and 3 nights - 72 hours later), Jesus rose triumphantly from the dead; and for the next forty days was occupied in setting up his Community.
It could not have been all the children of Israel since the majority of Israel had not returned from captivity in Assyria. Therefore those Israelites were elsewhere and not there in Jerusalem. The ones who were there though, from the remnant that had returned from the Babylonian captivity made sacrifices for all 12 tribes.All the children of Israel offered sacrifices for all the tribes of Israel. How do you square this with your theory that it was only Judah that returned from captivity?
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