When did the Jews start living in Palestine?

Answer 1

A:

According to The Bible, the Hebrew ancestors of the Jews fled from Egypt and conquered the land of the Canaanites, which incorporated the northern part of Palestine. Biblical chronology places this event around 1400 BCE, although a somewhat more recent Jewish tradition places it around a hundred years later.

Scholars say there was no Exodus from Egypt as described in the Bible, and that the Hebrews were really from the Canaanite rural lower classes. They say that some time around 1250 BCE, groups of Canaanites left the region of the rich coastal cities to settle peacefully in the hitherto sparsely populated hinterland.

Although most of the Jewish population left Palestine after the defeats suffered in the Roman-Jewish wars, there have always been at least a few thousand Jews in the region. Throughout history since the earliest times of Judaism, there has never been a time when Palestine has belonged exclusively to either Jews or non-Jews. Jewish Immigration, both legal and illegal began after the Crimean War and continued through the first half of the twentieth century, until the Jewish Declaration of Independence for Israel.

Answer:According to our tradition (Genesis ch.12), Abraham and his family came to Canaan (also called Palestine, Israel, or the Holy Land) in 1737 BCE. He raised up thousands of disciples, who lived in the land at the same time as the contemporary Canaanites, who honored him (Genesis ch.23). Abraham's Israelite descendants sojourned in Egypt (Genesis ch.46), and returned under Joshua in 1272 BCE (Joshua ch.3-4).