The twelve tribes of Israel

The Tribe of Judah

Son of Jacob by Leah · Name means Praise (Leah said, now will I praise the LORD) · Settled the largest southern territory, including Bethlehem, Hebron, and Jerusalem

Judah was the fourth son of Jacob by Leah, and his tribe became the greatest of the twelve, the royal tribe of kings. From Judah came David and the whole line of the kings of Judah, and from Judah, in the fullness of time, came Jesus Christ, the Lion of the tribe of Judah. Jacob's dying blessing over Judah reaches farther than any other, promising a ruler whose kingdom will never end.

The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be.Genesis 49:10 (KJV)

Judah the man

Judah was the fourth son of Leah, who at his birth said, Now will I praise the LORD, and called his name Judah, which means praise. Among the brothers he emerged as a leader. It was Judah who persuaded the others not to kill Joseph but to sell him, sparing his life, though the deed was still a grievous wrong. Years later Judah was a changed man: in Egypt he offered himself as a slave in Benjamin's place, unwilling to break his father's heart again. That willingness to lay down his own freedom for his brother is a foreshadowing of the greater Son who would come from his line.

Judah's story includes his own deep failure and repentance in the affair with Tamar, recorded honestly in Genesis. Judah had wronged his daughter-in-law, and when confronted he did not hide behind his power but confessed, She hath been more righteous than I. Out of that painful account came Perez, and through Perez ran the royal line to David and at last to Christ. Scripture hides none of it, and yet through it all God kept the thread of the promise unbroken, working his salvation not around human sin but straight through repentant sinners.

Jacob's blessing: the lion and the sceptre

Over no other son did Jacob speak such words. Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise: thy hand shall be in the neck of thine enemies; thy father's children shall bow down before thee. Then the great image: Judah is a lion's whelp; he stooped down, he couched as a lion; who shall rouse him up? From this comes the ancient title, the Lion of the tribe of Judah.

And then the promise that carries the whole hope of the Bible: The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be. The sceptre is the sign of kingship. Jacob foretold that royal rule would belong to Judah until the coming of Shiloh, a mysterious name long understood to mean the one to whom it belongs, the Messiah, to whom the nations would be gathered. It is a prophecy spoken over a dying man's sons that reaches all the way to Jesus.

The royal tribe and its land

Judah received the largest inheritance, a broad territory in the south of Canaan, holding Bethlehem, Hebron, and, once David captured it, Jerusalem, which became the city of the great King and the site of the temple. From Judah came David, the shepherd king, and after him Solomon and the whole line of kings who reigned in Jerusalem.

Judah led the way from the beginning. In the wilderness the tribe of Judah camped on the east side of the tabernacle and marched first, at the head of all the armies of Israel, and it was the largest of the tribes in the census. When the kingdom split after Solomon, ten tribes went north and were eventually lost, but the tribe of Judah, with Benjamin joined to it, remained loyal to the house of David in the south. From that southern kingdom the very name of the people, the Jews, is drawn, for Jew means one of Judah.

The prophet Micah looked to a small town in Judah's hill country and foretold the birthplace of the coming ruler: But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting. Even in exile and return, the promise to Judah held. The line of David was preserved through every threat, waiting for the King who would fulfill it, and the little town of Bethlehem waited too.

Judah in God's plan: the Lion who is the Lamb

Every thread of Judah's story is gathered up in Jesus. He was born in Bethlehem of Judah, of the house and lineage of David, of the tribe of Judah, as the New Testament plainly declares. The sceptre came at last to the one to whom it belonged, and the gathering of the people to him has been going on ever since, out of every nation under heaven.

In the Revelation, when no one is found worthy to open the sealed book of God's purposes, one of the elders says, Weep not: behold, the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the book. And when John turns to look for the Lion, he sees instead a Lamb, as it had been slain. That is the mystery at the heart of the whole Bible: the Lion of Judah conquers not by devouring his enemies but by being slain for them, and reigns forever as the King who is also the sacrifice. From the tribe named praise came the one to whom all praise is due.

A note on counting the twelve: Jacob had twelve sons, but the tribes are reckoned in more than one way in Scripture. The tribe of Levi was set apart for the priesthood and received no territory of its own, and Joseph, given the double portion of the firstborn, was counted as two tribes through his sons Ephraim and Manasseh. So when the land was divided the tribes still numbered twelve, with Levi outside the count. Different lists in the Bible reflect this: the blessing of Moses in Deuteronomy leaves out Simeon, and the sealed tribes in Revelation 7 omit Dan and Ephraim while naming Levi, Joseph, and Manasseh. The number twelve is preserved as a sign of the whole people of God.

Related: The Tribe of Benjamin · The Tribe of Levi · Who is Jesus? · Jacob in the Bible · All twelve tribes