Which of the two Israelite Kingdoms remained faithful to God and which did not?

Answer 1

A:The real answer is neither kingdom and yet both. Lester L Grabbe (Ancient Israel: What Do We Know and How Do We Know It?) says that The Bible pictures the Israelite religion as pure, monotheistic and different from the false worship of all other nations and peoples but a broader view (including the evidence of Archaeology) of Hebrew worship is that it is very much at home among the other Semitic religions, especially those of the Northwest Semitic region. Both kingdoms were polytheistic and both included Yahweh (bibl. Heb: YHWH) in their pantheon of gods.

When Israel was destroyed in 722 BCE, it had remained polytheistic, as was Judah. However, Judah in the late monarchical period moved towards monolatry and had become monotheistic by the end of the Babylonian Exile. On the strictest measure of monotheistic belief, Judah was the nation that became faithful to God, but not while ruled as a kingdom.

The Old Testament was written by people of Judah during the monolatrous and monotheistic phases. They had no interest in glorifying the already ancient history of Israel, and wrote a warts and all story of the supposed struggles of prophets against impious kings. The polytheistic history of Judah could not be entirely suppressed in the biblical account, but was leavened with stories of God's prophets to portray a people who were faithful to God even if they often strayed.

Answer:The Israelite religion is pure and monotheistic, but we never claimed that all of us were perfect in adhering to its standards. Because the prophets reported the words of God, they included His chastisements verbatim, so our shortcomings are not glossed over. Yet the Israelites never invented an idol; and our tradition is that some of us, whether many or few, always remained loyal to God and the Torah; and it is they whose heritage we Jews have received.

To answer the question, Hosea 12:1 is understood to mean that the kingdom of Judah was more loyal to God than that of the Ten Tribes. This is why God allowed Judah to return to the Holy Land after the brief Babylonian exile, but the Ten Tribes were lost.