Who Is Israel in the Bible? — Covenant, Not Country
'Not all who are descended from Israel are Israel' — Romans 9:6. Paul did not stutter. The most important word in the Bible is not what most people think it means.
The Most Important Word You May Have Misunderstood
'Israel' may be the most consequential word in the Bible, and also the most misread. Most modern readers encounter it and think of a place — a strip of land on the eastern Mediterranean. But for the vast majority of biblical history, 'Israel' did not refer to a geography. It referred to a relationship. Its meaning was covenantal before it was territorial, and spiritual before it was political.
The word first appears in Genesis 32:28, when Jacob wrestles with a mysterious figure through the night and is renamed: 'Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.' The name means 'one who wrestles with God' — and that is a definition worth holding on to, because it describes something much larger than an ethnicity or a nation-state.
From Jacob's new name flows the people of Israel, the twelve tribes, the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, the exile, the return, and — most radically — Paul's redefinition in Romans 9:6: 'Not all who are descended from Israel are Israel.' This is not a throwaway line. It is the theological center of the letter to the Romans. Paul is arguing that the identity 'Israel' was never fundamentally about bloodline — it was about covenant. And that argument reshapes everything.
This essay traces the word 'Israel' through Scripture, from Genesis to Galatians, following the text rather than any modern framework. The goal is theological clarity, not political commentary — the biblical concept of Israel predates the modern state by roughly three thousand years, and conflating the two is a category error with a short intellectual history.
What the Text Actually Says
Genesis 32:28
The Name's Origin“Then the man said, 'Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.'”Read in context →
Romans 9:6-8
Paul's Redefinition“It is not as though God's word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham's children... It is not the children by physical descent who are God's children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham's offspring.”Read in context →
Galatians 6:16
The Israel of God“Peace and mercy to all who follow this rule — to the Israel of God.”Read in context →
Galatians 3:28-29
Heirs by Promise“There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.”Read in context →
Romans 2:28-29
Inward Identity“A person is not a Jew who is one only outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. No, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code.”Read in context →
Hosea 1:10
The Expanding Covenant“In the place where it was said to them, 'You are not my people,' they will be called 'children of the living God.'”Read in context →
Isaiah 49:6
Light to the Nations“It is too small a thing for you to be my servant to restore the tribes of Jacob and bring back those of Israel I have kept. I will also make you a light for the Gentiles, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.”Read in context →
Ephesians 2:14-16
One New Humanity“For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility... His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace.”Read in context →
How 'Israel' Evolves Through Scripture
1. Jacob Becomes Israel — A Covenantal Name
The name 'Israel' begins not as a nation but as a name given to one man who wrestled with God (Genesis 32:28). It means 'one who strives with God' or 'God strives.' The twelve tribes that descend from Jacob-Israel carry this covenantal identity — they are 'Israel' not because of geography but because of relationship. When Moses leads them out of Egypt, God calls them 'my people' and 'a kingdom of priests' (Exodus 19:6) — again, a vocational and relational identity, not a merely ethnic one.
2. The Prophets — Covenant Broken, Covenant Remembered
The prophets consistently treat Israel's identity as conditional on faithfulness to the covenant. Amos, speaking to the northern kingdom, warns: 'Are not you Israelites the same to me as the Cushites?' (Amos 9:7). Hosea names his children 'Lo-Ammi' — 'not my people' — then promises restoration to those who were 'not my people.' Isaiah envisions Israel's purpose extending to all nations: 'I will make you a light for the Gentiles' (Isaiah 49:6). The prophets never treat Israelite identity as an unconditional racial entitlement — it is always tethered to covenant faithfulness, and its ultimate scope always extends beyond the ethnic boundary.
3. Jesus — The True Israel
The Gospel writers present Jesus as embodying Israel's story. His forty days in the wilderness recapitulate Israel's forty years. His twelve disciples mirror the twelve tribes. Matthew's genealogy traces him through the covenant line. Jesus does not replace Israel — He fulfills what Israel was always meant to be: the faithful covenant partner, the light to the nations, the seed through whom all families of the earth are blessed. When He says 'I am the vine' (John 15:5), He claims the image the prophets used for Israel itself (Isaiah 5:1-7).
4. Paul — 'Not All Israel Is Israel'
Paul's argument in Romans 9-11 is the most sustained theological treatment of this question in the New Testament. His thesis in 9:6 — 'not all who are descended from Israel are Israel' — is grounded in the Genesis narrative itself. Isaac, not Ishmael, carried the promise. Jacob, not Esau, was chosen. The pattern has always been selection by promise rather than bloodline. In Galatians 3:29, Paul draws the conclusion: 'If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.' The covenant community has been opened to include all who have faith — not instead of but as the fulfillment of God's promise to Abraham.
5. Dispensationalism — A 19th-Century Framework
The idea that modern geopolitical Israel occupies a unique prophetic role — separate from the church, with distinct end-times promises — originated with John Nelson Darby in the 1830s and was popularized by the Scofield Reference Bible (1909). This framework, called dispensationalism, teaches that God has two distinct peoples (Israel and the church) with two distinct programs. It has no documented precedent in the first 1,800 years of Christian theology. The church fathers, the medieval church, the Reformers, and the Puritans all read 'Israel' in the New Testament as referring to the covenant community that includes believing Gentiles. Dispensationalism's influence in American evangelicalism is enormous, but its novelty as a theological system is worth acknowledging.
6. What This Means for Reading the Bible
When Paul writes 'the Israel of God' (Galatians 6:16), when he says 'a person is a Jew who is one inwardly' (Romans 2:29), when he declares that in Christ 'there is neither Jew nor Gentile' (Galatians 3:28) — he is not discarding Israel's identity. He is fulfilling it. The covenant was always headed toward inclusion. Abraham was told that through him 'all nations on earth will be blessed' (Genesis 12:3). The trajectory was never inward; it was always outward. Reading 'Israel' as a purely ethnic or geopolitical category imports a modern framework onto an ancient text. Reading it as a covenantal identity that culminates in Christ is what the New Testament authors themselves argue.
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Frequently Asked Questions
What does 'Israel' mean in the Bible?
The name 'Israel' first appears in Genesis 32:28 when God renames Jacob after he wrestles with a divine being. It means 'one who strives with God.' Throughout the Old Testament, it refers to Jacob's descendants as a covenant people. In the New Testament, Paul redefines it in Romans 9:6 — 'not all who are descended from Israel are Israel' — arguing that the identity is covenantal, based on promise and faith rather than bloodline.
Does 'Israel' in the Bible refer to the modern country?
The biblical concept of Israel is primarily covenantal and theological, predating the modern nation-state by about 3,000 years. The prophets, Jesus, and Paul all treat 'Israel' as an identity defined by relationship with God, not geography alone. The modern conflation of biblical Israel with the contemporary state relies largely on dispensationalism, a theological framework developed in the 1830s with no precedent in the first 1,800 years of Christianity.
What does Romans 9:6 mean when it says 'not all Israel is Israel'?
Paul is arguing that Israelite identity was never purely about ethnic descent. He points to the Genesis narrative itself: Isaac (not Ishmael), Jacob (not Esau) carried the promise. The pattern was always selection by faith and promise, not automatic inheritance by blood. Paul extends this logic: those who belong to Christ through faith are 'Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise' (Galatians 3:29).
What is dispensationalism?
Dispensationalism is a theological framework developed by John Nelson Darby in the 1830s, popularized in America through the Scofield Reference Bible (1909). It teaches that God has two distinct peoples (ethnic Israel and the church) with separate prophetic programs. Most end-times prophecy culture (the rapture, the tribulation, a rebuilt temple) comes from this framework. It has been enormously influential in American evangelicalism but has no documented precedent in the first eighteen centuries of Christian theology.
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