From the State of Israel to the State of Judea

While we are celebrating Hanukkah today, a question arises: why isn’t the State if Israel called the “State of Judea”? Not only was the last successful Jewish war of independence led by Judah Maccabee, but the nation that earlier survived and returned from the Babylonian exile was called “Judea” – a name that stuck for several centuries.

As matter of surmise, I wouldn’t be surprised if by the year 2050 the “State of Israel” were to be changed to the “State of Judea”. Here’s why – with three different but interrelated explanations.

First some background as to why the new nation in 1948 was called “Israel” at all. Indeed, this was a major issue on the pre-government’s table: what name should the new country have? The most obvious option was “Judea,” given its historical gravitas as the historical name of the area around Jerusalem. Unfortunately, in 1948 that seemed the territorial area least likely to become part of the new state; in the U.N.’s partition plan, Jerusalem and most of the Judaean Mountains would be outside the new state (as would be all or most of Jerusalem). Moreover, as historical Judea applied only to a relatively small territory of the new state that would contain land far beyond in the north (Galilee) and south (Negev), the historical parallel to Judea back then would be misleading.

During the debate, another problem was raised: if the state’s name was Judea, what would the citizenry be called: Ye’hudim? That wouldn’t be very acceptable (or logical) for the new state’s half-million+ Arab citizens.
With the pressure of time – the issue was being debated a mere few days before the state would be formally established – Ben-Gurion put forward the name of “Israel” and it passed with lukewarm support. Why the lack of enthusiasm?

As suggested by Yitzḥak Gruenbaum – the central leader of Polish Jewry between the two world wars, subsequently chairman of the Jewish Agency Rescue Committee during the Holocaust, and ultimately Israel’s first Minister of the Interior – the perceived main reason Ben-Gurion preferred “Israel” is that it had a secular connotation as opposed to the far more Jewish “Judea.” In other words, Ben-Gurion was after a symbolic break with Jewish history from the galut (exilic) Jewish past – with the name “Israel,” Israel’s first prime minister sought to create a new national identity, using but also superseding the Jewish people’s national identity.
In a sense, this came to pass – which brings us to the first reason that “Judea” in the not so distant future might yet win out. In one sense, Ben-Gurion was being disingenuous, for he knew Jewish history very well: 3000 years ago there were 12 tribes divided into two kingdoms: 10 tribes in the Kingdom of Israel, and 2 tribes in the Kingdom of Judea. The main difference between them? The former were largely polytheistic; the latter were mostly monotheistic. In terms of Jewish values, the Kingdom of Israel was “secular”. However, it eventually disappeared in the Assyrian conquest of the north, leaving the Kingdom of Judea to be the sole carrier of future Jewish history.

Today, history seems to be “rhyming” (not exactly repeating), as demographically the population of Israel is becoming increasingly religious. Not due to any “return to the fold” but rather a result of birth rates: the ultra-Orthodox with 6-7 children per family, the National Orthodox with around 4 per family, and the rest of Israeli Jews barely at 3 children per household. Thus, from a purely demographic-religious standpoint, “Judea” is on the way.

Nor is this only a matter of population. Under political pressure by Israel’s religious communities, policymaking is increasingly tending to religious considerations: gender-separate classes in the universities; ditto for some public performances; greater civil authority for the Rabbinate; and so on.

Add to this a second factor: territorial. The creeping expansion of the country’s territory is (at the present) in one place: Judea & Samaria. Talk of annexing this territory (that also contains a few million Palestinians) is growing stronger. Whether that comes to pass de jure, it is certainly happening de facto. Thus, the initial 1948 problem that logically precluded the name “Judea” for the nascent state, no longer exists as a practical obstacle to renaming the state.

Indeed, the first “move” in that direction was legislated in 2018: Basic Law – Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People. It established (similar to a Constitutional Amendment) the Jewish primacy of the country. All that needs to be done in the future is to change the word “Israel” to “Judea” – matching its last two words: “Jewish People.”

A third and final factor for “Judea” as a replacement of “Israel” takes us even further back – to the very beginning of Jewish “history.” Our third forefather’s original name was Jacob (in Hebrew: “on the heels of…”) but it was changed to Israel (“struggling with God”) after his midnight dream tussle with… (take your pick: an angel, God, himself etc.).

However, interestingly in that story “Israel” continued to shy away from fighting anyone! Not with Esau (offering him massive bribes), not with Laban (even when conned into marrying the wrong sister), and even scolding his sons for avenging the rape of his daughter Dinah.
Who did show bravery in the Book of Genesis? Judah: admitting that he (unknowingly) slept with his daughter-in-law; facing up to his unrecognized Viceroy Joseph brother.

Given the State of Israel’s “neighborhood,” the country has become increasingly militarized. This is not to say that the military runs the country; it does not. It is to say that “bravery” has become the highest value in Israeli society – not something that our forefather“Israel” stood for. Thus, changing the country’s name to Judea would be bringing it closer to its true, present psychological state of mind and value system.

None of this is to argue that a change from “Israel” to “Judea” is a good idea – or that the socio-political-religious-military phenomena I have enumerated above are necessarily positive. I leave that to each of you, the reader. However, it is a useful way of looking at deep-rooted trends in Israeli society: past, present, and future.