Now, I want to clear up a confusion before we really kind of get deep into this sermon
about the Jews versus Israel, because these are not synonymous at all, but they're used
interchangeably in today's world, and in fact, I use them interchangeably because they're
kind of understood interchangeably, but biblically speaking, the Jews in Israel are by no means
the same thing, and it's important to understand this.
We see this in 1 Kings 11, verse 28.
And the man Jeroboam was a mighty man of valor, and Solomon seeing the young man that he was
industrious, he made him ruler over all the charge of the house of Joseph.
Now, I want to say on a side point, do not confuse Jeroboam with Rehoboam.
Rehoboam is the son of Solomon that takes over for him.
Jeroboam was one of the men of Solomon who ends up being against Solomon, okay?
Verse 29, and it came to pass at that time when Jeroboam went out of Jerusalem, that
the prophet Ahishah the Shilinite found him in the way, and he had clad himself with a
new garment, and they too were alone in the field.
And Ahishah caught the new garment that was on him and rent it in 12 pieces.
So imagine, you know, you're wearing clothing, and then all of a sudden somebody just tears
your clothing, right?
Like if I went up to you and just tore your shirt to like 12 pieces, right?
And that's what the prophet does to Jeroboam.
Then it says this in verse 31, and he said to Jeroboam, take the 10 pieces for thus saith
the Lord, the God of Israel, behold, I will rend the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon
and will give 10 tribes to thee.
So what he says is, I'm taking the kingdom from Solomon, and you're going to get 10 out
of the 12 tribes.
Verse 32, but he shall have one tribe for my servant David's sake, and for Jerusalem's
sake, the city which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel.
Now in verses 30 through 32, this is known as one of the great Bible contradictions.
Because remember, he said, I'm going to rend it in 12 pieces, and he said, I'm going to
give him 10 pieces, you 10 pieces, and I'm going to leave one piece for him.
You don't have to be an expert at math to realize that 10 plus 1 does not equal 12,
right?
10 plus 1 equals 11.
So you say, well, why is it 12 pieces?
And then he mentions 11 pieces.
Well, the 10 tribes is accurate.
It is 10 tribes.
The one tribe is kind of accurate, it's kind of not, because the one tribe he's referring
to is the tribe of Judah, okay?
And what you would have is the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah.
Now the northern kingdom of Israel, it retains its name after this event.
You say, why?
Because they retained 10 out of the 12 tribes.
I mean, imagine that there is a committee with like 12 people and two leave.
You're probably not going to rename the committee because two are no longer a part of it.
But if you're a small remnant left, you're probably going to rename it, right?
Like for example, think of like music and a couple people split off from a band and
start a new band with a new name, right?
And so the 10 tribes, they retain the name of Israel.
You have the northern kingdom of Israel.
And then what you have is the southern kingdom of Judah.
But the southern kingdom of Judah was not really by themselves.
The tribe of Benjamin is the other tribe that goes along with Judah.
You say, why does it say one tribe?
Because there's one dominant tribe named after the tribe of Judah.
And so Judah was one of the 12 tribes of Israel.
And it's the dominant one in the southern kingdom of Judah.
But Benjamin is also with it.
So if you're to try to split the names, because you know, maybe you'd say, well, Judah and
Benjamin, let's just kind of combine them and you got Jin-jim-en.
It's not that great of a name.
Or if you got Benjamin and Judah, you got Buddha, right?
And so they didn't name the new kingdom Buddha.
It's Judah.
Okay.
I personally, I much prefer the name Judah than Buddha.
Okay.
Or Jin-jim-en, right?