Why did the tribes of Israel maintain a connection?

Answer 1

A:Based on the biblical account of the sojourn in Egypt, it should be more a mater of surprise that the Hebrew tribes came into separate existence than that they subsequently maintained a connection. Genesis says that the brothers travelled together to Egypt during a famine and were permitted by the pharaoh to live together in their own region of Egypt. Merely a small, close-knit family, the children of Israel were far from becoming separate tribes.

The Bible tells us that by the time Moses was born, the children of Israel had been enslaved by the Egyptians. This traumatic event and the disruption to family and social life that slavery always involves should have pulled the Israelites closer together, not pushed them into separate identities. Yet we are told that, on the one hand, the Israelites voluntarily formed into twelve separate ethnic groups, but on the other hand maintained close ties amongst the different tribes.

The names of the tribes vary somewhat through the Old Testament narrative, suggesting a more fluid tribal history than generally recognised. Deuteronomy 33 lists eleven tribes: Reuben, Judah, Levi, Benjamin, Joseph (with both Ephraim and Manasseh named), Zebulun, Issachar, Gad, Dan, Naphtali, and Asher. Genesis 49 lists Reuben, Judah, Levi, Benjamin, Joseph, Zebulun, Issachar, Gad, Dan, Naphtali, Asher and Simeon. The Song of Deborah (Judges 5:2-31), which honours those tribes of Israel that joined in battle against a Canaanite coalition and castigates those that held back, names ten tribes as Reuben, Benjamin, Ephraim, Manasseh, Zebulon, Issachar, Dan, Naphtali, Asher, Gilead, to which we should add Levi. This list notably omits Judah, as well as Simeon and Gad, but has Gilead.

As long as the Hebrew nations was small and vulnerable to attack by the much stronger neighbours, it made sense for the tribes to maintain a connection and provide mutual support, although the Song of Deborah suggests that this was not always the case. With the development of the separate kingdoms of Israel and Judah, loyalties were to the state and no longer to the tribe. The frequent tension and battles between Israel and Judah were not influenced by old inter-tribal loyalties.