Essay On Hebrew People

The beginning of the history of the Hebrew can be marked by the migration of Abraham and his people from Mesopotamia to Canaan, the promised land. The hebrew people originated from the polytheistic and animistic semitic tribes in Mesopotamia. With the covenant promising Abraham’s people a “promised land” in Canaan, the Hebrews migrated from their homeland in Mesopotamia to Canaan. The second covenant was made hundreds of years later, when Moses lead the jewish people out of slavery in Egypt. This covenant gave the Hebrew people a set of laws from their god, called the 10 commandments. This marked the beginning of Judaism as a structured religion. They became a monotheistic people, the first of their kind in the world. Because of the tenets of the religion being generally exclusive and unfamiliar …show more content…
As a monotheistic religion unlike any previous religion, the Hebrew people held great importance to maintaining loyalty to their god and no other entity. Although they had a line of patriarchs, upholding the core of the religion during the rise of Judaism, they lacked real, political leadership. This is ironic because of the Jews’ connection to their homeland as the one of the bases for their cultural identity. As the hebrew people were establishing and developing their identity within their community, they maintained peace through the commandments given to them by god, who they saw as their leader. (Posner) For most of its early history, the jewish land of Israel, and its people, were lead by “judges and prophets.” (Posner) This lack of strong leadership and a structured government, in contrast to monarchical political structures in surrounding empires such as Mesopotamia, Egypt, Assyria, etc. contributed in detaining the development and growth of the small of the Jewish