After the prophecy to David of the planting of the people of Israel in a new land (2 Samuel 7:10), his kingdom was divided into Israel (ten tribes) and Judah (two tribes). Israel was ruled by Ephraim and its capital was Samaria. The royal line of Judah ruled in the kingdom of Judah whose capital was Jerusalem.

Judah was to serve a purpose still whereas Israel was to be taken away. This is the prophecy given by Hosea:

I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel; but I will utterly take them away.
But I will have mercy upon the house of Judah …. (Hosea 1:6-7)

and again:

Ephraim compasseth me about with lies, and the house of Israel with deceit: but Judah yet ruleth with God, and is faithful with the saints. (Hosea 11:12)

The deportation of Israel

The Almighty intended to use Assyria to take Israel away:

O Assyrian, the rod of mine anger, and the staff in their hand is mine indignation.
I will send him against an hypocritical nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge, to take the spoil, and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets. (Isaiah 10:5-6)

The deportation of the House of Israel by Assyria took place in stages, recorded in 2 Kings 15:29, 1 Chronicles 5:26, 2 Kings 17:1-6 and 2 Kings 18:9-11. Israel was completely removed from the land:

So was Israel carried away out of their own land to Assyria unto this day. (2 Kings 17:23)

The northern kingdom was re-populated by Assyria with people from various places, including Babylon: 2 Kings 17:24.

The restoration of Israel

Judah contained the royal line; only the sceptre was given to Judah (Genesis 49:10). The main birthright was given to Joseph (Ephraim and Manasseh – Genesis 49:22-26) who were included in the ten tribes comprising the House of Israel. Israel’s seed, it was foretold, would

spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south (Genesis 28:14)

Israel, the father of the nations, was promised

a nation and a company of nations shall be of thee (Genesis 35:11)

Those promises passed to the sons of Joseph:

he [Manasseh] also shall become a people, and he also shall be great: but truly his younger brother [Ephraim] shall be greater than he, and his seed shall become a multitude of nations. (Genesis 48:19)

After the ten tribes were deported, Jeremiah was given the commission to build and plant the nations and kingdoms. Israel’s deportation occurred before Jeremiah’s time. Hosea wrote of its downfall and restoration

Israel is swallowed up: now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure.
For they are gone up to Assyria, a wild ass alone by himself: Ephraim hath hired lovers.
Yea, though they have hired among the nations, now will I gather them (Hosea 8:8-10)

Of Ephraim, whom God called his firstborn (Jeremiah 31:9), Hosea says

My God will cast them away, because they did not hearken unto him: and they shall be wanderers among the nations. (Hosea 9:17)

Yet Ephraim was not to be destroyed:

How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? how shall I deliver thee, Israel? … mine heart is turned within me, my repentings are kindled together.
I will not execute the fierceness of mine anger, I will not return to destroy Ephraim (Hosea 11:8-9)

The deportation of Judah

The royal line and part of the people of Judah were deported to Babylon and an attempt was made to destroy the royal line, as mentioned in the previous post. Because Judah did not learn from Israel’s mistakes, it was also to be taken away:

The word of the LORD came again unto me, saying,
Son of man, there were two women, the daughters of one mother: ….
And the names of them were Aholah the elder, and Aholibah her sister: and they were mine, and they bare sons and daughters. Thus were their names; Samaria is Aholah, and Jerusalem Aholibah.
And Aholah played the harlot when she was mine; and she doted on her lovers, on the Assyrians her neighbours, ….
Wherefore I have delivered her into the hand of her lovers, into the hand of the Assyrians, upon whom she doted.
And when her sister Aholibah saw this, she was more corrupt in her inordinate love than she, and in her whoredoms more than her sister in her whoredoms.
Therefore, O Aholibah, thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I will raise up thy lovers against thee, from whom thy mind is alienated, and I will bring them against thee on every side;
For thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I will deliver thee into the hand of them whom thou hatest, into the hand of them from whom thy mind is alienated: (Ezekiel 23:1-2, 4-5, 9, 11, 22, 28)

The destinies of Israel and Judah compared

Jeremiah was later given separate prophecies concerning the respective fates of the Houses of Israel and Judah. Israel was to restored as a nation ruled by the House of David (the royal line of Judah). Judah was never to be made whole again.

Israel is likened to a vessel re-made by a potter:

Then I went down to the potter’s house, and, behold, he wrought a work on the wheels.
And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.
Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying,
O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter? saith the LORD. Behold, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel….
If that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. ( Jeremiah 18:3-6, 8 )

These verses speak of the remaking of Israel, as a vessel in the hands of God.

In the following chapter, Judah is described as a hard-baked bottle which, once broken, cannot be remade:

Thus saith the LORD, Go and get a potter’s earthen bottle, ….
And say, Hear ye the word of the LORD, O kings of Judah, and inhabitants of Jerusalem; Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will bring evil upon this place, the which whosoever heareth, his ears shall tingle.
Then shalt thou break the bottle in the sight of the men that go with thee,
And shalt say unto them, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Even so will I break this people and this city, as one breaketh a potter’s vessel, that cannot be made whole again (Jeremiah 19:1, 3, 10-11

The time will come, however, when Israel and Judah will be reunited. Until that time, Judah cannot be made whole. Ezekiel speaks of the reunion:

The word of the LORD came again unto me, saying,
Moreover, thou son of man, take thee one stick, and write upon it, For Judah, and for the children of Israel his companions: then take another stick, and write upon it, For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim and for all the house of Israel his companions:
And join them one to another into one stick; and they shall become one in thine hand.
And when the children of thy people shall speak unto thee, saying, Wilt thou not shew us what thou meanest by these?
Say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I will take the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel his fellows, and will put them with him, even with the stick of Judah, and make them one stick, and they shall be one in mine hand.
And the sticks whereon thou writest shall be in thine hand before their eyes.
And say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I will take the children of Israel from among the heathen, whither they be gone, and will gather them on every side, and bring them into their own land:
And I will make them one nation in the land upon the mountains of Israel; and one king shall be king to them all: and they shall be no more two nations, neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all. (Ezekiel 37:15-22)