comprehended imder the number twelve, which was the more natural, since one of tliem, namely, the caste of the Levites, ilid not live wiibin such exclusive geo- gra])hical limiis as were assigned to the others after they exchanged their nomadic migrations for settled habitations, but dwelt in towns scattered through all the other twelve tribes. It is also remarkable that the Ishmaelites, as well as the Israelites, were divided into twelve tribes; and that the Persians also, according to Xenophon {Ct/rojxedid, i, 2,4 sq. ), were similarly di- vided. Among other nations also occur ethnological and geographical divisions, according to the number twelve. Erom this we infer that the number twelve was held in so much favor that, when possible, doubt- ful cases were adapted to it. An analogous case wo find even at a later period, when the spiritual progeni- tors of the Christian cojci-Kd(pi'\ot'. or the apostles, who were, after the death of Judas, the election of jNIatthias, and the vocation of Paul, really thirteen in n\imber, were, nevertheless, habitually viewed as twelve; so that wherever, during the IMiddle Ages, any division was made with reference to the apostles, the number twelve, and not thirteen, was adopted, whether applied to the halls of theological libraries, or to the great barrels of costly wines in the cellar of the civic authorities at Bremen. Concerning the arrangement of these tribes on their march through the wilderness, in their en- campments around the ark, and in their occupation of the land of Canaan, see the cognate articles, such, as ExoDE ; Encami'ment ; Genealogies; Levites, Wandering; and the names ofthe several tribes. We confine ourselves here to two points.
T. The "Lost Tribes." — This has been an inexhausti- ble source of theologico-historical charlatanism, on which there have been written so many volumes that it would be difficult to condense the contradictory opinions ad- vanced in them within the limits of a moderate article. Suffice it to say that there is scarcely any human race so abject, forlorn, and dwindling, located anywhere be- tween the Chinese and the American Indians, who have not been stated to be the ten tribes which disa]ipeared from history during and after the Babylonian cajitivity. If the books written on the ten tribes contained much truth, it would be diflicult to say where they are not.
The truth, however, of the matter seems rather to be as follows. After the division of the Israelites under Jeroboam and Eehoboam into the two kingdoms of Judah and Israel, the believers in whom the feelings of ancient theocratic legitimacy and nationality pre- dominated, and especially the priests and Levites, who were connected by many ties with the sanctuary at Jerusalem, had a tendency to migrate towards the vis- ible centre of their devotions; while those members of the tribes of Jiidah and Benjamin who had an individ- ual hankering after the foreign fashions ado|ited in Samaria, and the whole kingdom of Israel, had a ten- dency externally to unite themselves to a state of things corresponding with their individuality. After the political fall of both kingdoms, when all the princi- pal families connected with tbe possession of the soil had been compelled to emigrate, most Israelites who had previously little feeling for theocratic nationality gradually amalgamated bv marriages and other con- nections with the natir)ns by which they were sur- rounded; while the former inhabitants of the kingdom of Judah felt their nationality revived by the very dep- rivation of public worship which they suffered in for- eign lauds. Many of the pious members of those tribes which ha<l formerly constituted the kingdom of Israel undoubtedly joined the returning colonies which pro- ceeded, by permission of the Persian monarchs, to the land of their fathers. However, these former mem- bers ofthe other tribes formed so decidedly a minority among the members of the tribe of Judah that hence- forth all believers and worshippers of Jehovah were called W^'i'T^'^/lovcaioi, Judeei, Jews. Thus it came
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to pass that the best, although smaller, portion of the ten tribes amalgamated with the Jews, some of whom preserved their genealogies till after the destruction of Jerusalem ; while the larger proportion of the ten tribes amalgamated with the Gentiles of Central Asia, to w'hom they pmbably imparted some of tiieir notions and customs, which again were, in a state more or less pure, propagated to distant regions by the great na- tional migrations proceeding from Central Asia. We are glad to find that this, our historical conviction, has also been adopted by the most learned among the Jews themselves (see Jost, Alk/emeine Gesc/tic/ite des israeli- lischen Volkes [Berlin, 1832], i, 407 sq., 416 sq.).— Kitto. See Captivity.
II. Boundar}/ - lines of the Tribes IdenHfied. — This topic has usually been abandoned by commentators as hopeless. Keil {Comment, on Josh.) is really the only one who has seriously grappled with its difficulties, some of which even he is compelled to pronounce in- soluble. See each tribe in its alphabetical place.
1. Reuben. — On the south, being the southern boundary of tlie traiis-Jordanic tribes, beginning at the mouth of the river Anion (Wady el-Mojeb) on the Dead Sea; thence along the Anion to Aroer (Aniir) (Josh, xiii, 10); thence along the south-eastern boundary of the trans-Jordanic tribes (which extended as far as the "plain" or table- land stietchuig eastward from Jordan [xii, 1], being that containing Medeba and Dibon [xiii, 9]) (north-easterly along the'Wady Eulcheileh to Lejilm); thence along tlie eastern boundary of the trans-Jordanic tribes (east of the ruins of El-IIerri) ; then with an inclination west of north so as to exclude Jazer (ver. 25) (Seir), also Rabbath-ain- mon (2 Sam. xi, 1) (to a point below Jebeiha wliich was excluded, probably being the Jogbehah of the Gadites, Numb, xxxii, 35) ; thence entirely south ofGilead (Josh, xiii, 25) (directly west, down the wadies Naur and Hes- ban), excluding Beth-haraii (Beit-haran) (ver. 27) and Atruth-shophnn (near Merjaklieh) (Numb, xxxii, 35), but includini? Heshbou (Heshfin), Elealeh (El-'Al), Bamoth (conip. xxi, 19, 20) (probably Jebel Hiinieh), and Nebo (now discovered In Jebel Neba) (xxxii, .ST ; Josh, xiii, 17) ; thence southerly along the Jordan to the place of begin- ning (ver. 23).