WHOSE PROMISED LAND IS IT? – Part 2 Modern Borders
The ancient biblical concept of The Promised Land is the basis for the establishment of Israel as a modern-day nation. According to biblical accounts (see Part 1), the current Jewish nation of Israel only occupies a small portion of the original covenant promised boundaries of Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel).
Over the intervening two thousand years of exile, with only a small Jewish presence in the land, there always remained a glimmer of hope for the redemption and return of the Jewish people to their national home. This is a dream central to Jewish life and culture to this day.
Photo of a Pre-1948 Zionist map of the Land of Israel
While the Bible clearly states that Eretz Yisrael belongs to the Jews, there are many recent secular, gentile sources that also convey Jewish
Photo of U.N. General Assembly Partition Plan of Nov. 1947
ownership of The Promised Land:
In November 2, 1917, the Balfour Declaration became the foundational document written in favor of the establishment of the Jewish homeland, and was subsequently put into effect by the Mandate for Palestine in 1922. When the Ottoman Empire finally collapsed after WWI, Britain was assigned a portion of the former empire referred to as “Palestine” (today this is Jordan and Israel—including Gaza and the West Bank) under the Sykes-Picot Agreement in 1916.
The Mandate for Palestine was approved on July 24, 1922, which put the Balfour Declaration into effect. This mandate, authorized by the League of Nations, specifically referred to “the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine: and to the validity of reconstituting their national home in that country…”
The November 29, 1947 United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181, called for the establishment of a Jewish State by the Jewish
people in Eretz Yisrael. This resolution called for the partition of British-ruled Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab state.
The May 14, 1948 Israeli Declaration of Independence—the declaration of an independent Jewish—Eretz Yisrael!
“…We, members of the People’s Council, representative of the Jewish community of Eretz Yisrael and of the Zionists Movement, are herby assembled on the day of the termination of the British Mandate over Eretz Yishrael, and by virtue of our natural and historic right and on the strength of the resolution of The United Nations General Assembly, hereby declare the establishment of a Jewish State in Eretz Yishrael, to be known as The State of Israel…”
May 14,1948 in a museum in Tel Aviv, Israel was declared a Jewish homeland
“Who has ever seen anything as strange as this? Who ever heard of such a thing? Has a nation ever been born in a single day? Has a country ever come forth in a mere moment? But by the time Jerusalem’s birth pains begin, her children will be born.”—Isaiah 66.8
From declaring the right of return as recognized in the Balfour Declaration, reaffirmed by the Mandate for Palestine by the League of Nations, and finalized by the United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181, the road to fulfilling God’s covenant promises to Abram’s descendants was on-track.
These and many other historic milestones point toward the ultimate fulfillment of God’s covenant Promised Land.
The boundaries of the Promised Land are clearly defined by both God’s covenant promise, yet to-date, Israel has never held full control of the biblical Eretz Yisrael.
God has fulfilled so many of His covenant promises; and we can be assured that those remaining promises—including the promise to Abram’s descendents of a predefined Jewish homeland—will too, be fulfilled!