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>I'll just stick with the Word and its emphases.

Sounds good to me. Please tell me what you see in the following paragraphs that is all about "rabbit trails" and not Biblically based:

A 3-MINUTE HISTORY

Four Thousand years ago, Abraham (a great-great grandson of Shem, a son of Noah) and a small group of Hebrews (of which there were & are many varieties) migrated from southern Iraq to Canaan (~Palestine). Several generations later, around 1875 BC, his Grandson Jacob (who was renamed Israel) and his 12 Sons and families moved to Egypt. As offspring of Shem, they were called "Shemites" or " Semites", as were his many other offspring.

~1450 BC, now as the 12 Tribes of the 12 Sons of Israel, and over 3 Million strong, these Semites bailed out of Egypt in the well-documented EXODUS and fled back to Palestine. But the Tribes “couldn't all get along” there, so ~922 BC these 5 Million Israelites split into the Northern and Southern Kingdoms.

(In actual numbers, 5 Million people is about the same size as Ireland, Norway, Denmark or Israel today, and was 10% of the estimated 50 Million world population at that time. The world population is now ONE HUNDRED times as large. Compared to todays 6 Billion people, the Israelites relative population would have been over twice as large as the United States of America!)

The very large Northern Kingdom was made up of 10 of the Tribes. Inheriting the names which applied to all 12 Tribes before the split, it is known as the Kingdom of Israel or House of Israel , and is led by the Tribe of Ephraim . These Northern Israelites were taken into captivity by the Assyrians ~722 BC and relocated to the northern Fertile Crescent area of Iraq/Iran. They were not good about keeping up with changes in their eMail addresses, thus were called, by some, the "Lost Tribes", or "Lost Sheep" or "Lost Children" of the Kingdom of Israel. (But at ~1/12 of the worlds population it seems unlikely they would really disappear, or get "lost". The global population ~75 Million.)

The much smaller Southern Kingdom was made up of the Tribe of Judah & a mix of Levites and Benjamites. It was also known as the Kingdom of Judah or House of Judah , and it's inhabitants were later called Jews , as are their offspring today. These Southern Kingdom of Judah Israelites were taken captive in ~587 BC and removed to Babylon. Only ~50,000 returned to Palestine ~70 years later.