Every time I'm traveling abroad I have quiet moments when I begin to think just how far it is home. One night, in the middle of the Egyptian desert, I remember looking up at a cloudless starry night and realizing that I couldn't walk home, I couldn't drive home, and, the only way I would get home was to spend 10 long hours in an airplane hurdling through the sky at nearly the speed of sound. It's a sobering, sinking feeling, being that far from home.
It must have been far worse for the Jews of Bible times who were part of the diaspora (or dispersion). Jews and Christians who were forced to leave their homeland are said to be part of the diaspora or the scattering of the citizens of Israel throughout the then known world. Mostly this dispersion of people happened because the people were forced to leave. For instance, one such event that happened in 722 B.C. is found in 2 Kings 17:5, "Then the king of Assyria invaded all the land and came to Samaria; for three years he besieged it. In the ninth year of Hosea the king of Assyria captured Samaria; he carried the Israelites away to Assyria. He placed them in Halah, on the Harbor, the river of Bozan, and in the cities of the Medes." (New Revised Standard Version). Some years later (605 B.C.) Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon (the Saddam Hussein of his day) besieged Jerusalem and eventually took almost everyone captive, moving them to various places in his kingdom. Time after time, in both the Old Testament and the New Testament we read of people being uprooted against their will and sent off to be colonists in foreign lands. Jewish communities were found in most cities of the Roman Empire. In addition to the Jews who were dispersed by the captivities, thousands of them were lured to every part of the world by commercial activities.
Herod Agrippa II is supposed to have declared that "there is not a people in the world which does not contain a portion of our race" Josephus War ii. 16.4 [399] "In some cities, like Nehardea and Nisibis in Mesopotamia, whence the wise men may have come, Jews formed a majority of the population. A large proportion of the inhabitants of Syria were Jews. Josephus estimated the number of Jews in Egypt alone at one million. In Alexandria Egypt, they are said to have constituted a third of the population." 5BC59.
It is against this backdrop of history that we can easier understand passages of Scripture such as: James 1:1, "to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad" and 1 Peter 1:1, "Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. . . " Also, the long list of countries listed in Acts 2:8-11 seems very likely to be a representative list of where Jews were living outside of their homeland. For a while, even Jesus lived abroad, ". . . the angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream, saying, Arise, and take the young child and his mother and flee to flee to Egypt," Matthew 2:13.
Bible historians point out that it is precisely because of the dispersion of Jews and Christians that the Gospel was able to go to all of the world. As the first evangelists left Israel they could begin spreading the Good News among their countrymen abroad and then branched out from there.
Modern-day students of God's Word are reminded that much of the Bible was written for people who must have been often thinking about home.

Blessings in your study of God's Word!

Marvin Hunt

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Blessings!
Marvin Hunt

Http://www.biblehistory.com

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