BANNERS OF THE 12 TRIBES

[FIRESTORM314]

Does anybody have any idea what the banners of the 12 Tribes of Israel actually look like or where they just the names written down on flags?

Numbers 2:2
Then the LORD said to Moses and Aaron: “ The Israelites are to camp under their respective banners beside the flags of their families, around the Tent of Meeting at a distance from it. On the east side, toward the sunrise, the divisions of Judah are to camp under their banner

 

[Steve Petersen]

Does anybody have any idea what the banners of the 12 Tribes of Israel actually look like or where they just the names written down on flags?

Numbers 2:2
Then the LORD said to Moses and Aaron: “ The Israelites are to camp under their respective banners beside the flags of their families, around the Tent of Meeting at a distance from it. On the east side, toward the sunrise, the divisions of Judah are to camp under their banner

FLAG - JewishEncyclopedia.com

 

[FIRESTORM314]

FLAG - JewishEncyclopedia.com

Thanks Steve - that description does make sense
Has it been verified by Archeology?

 

[LaSorcia]

At the local Jewish Community Center that I belong to, the flags of each tribe are hanging in the pool area. This was the only pic I could find, not great and doesn't show them all, but better than nothing I guess. You can see the lion of the tribe of Judah on the back left flag.

 

[Steve Petersen]

Thanks Steve - that description does make sense
Has it been verified by Archeology?

No.

 

[συνείδησις]

It was either Bullinger or Seiss (The Witness in the Stars and The Gospel in the Stars; can't remember which wrote which) who said or conjectured that the emblems corresponded with the 12 signs of the zodiac.

 

[Steve Petersen]

It was either Bullinger or Seiss (The Witness in the Stars and The Gospel in the Stars; can't remember which wrote which) who said or conjectured that the emblems corresponded with the 12 signs of the zodiac.

It seems there is some connection, not necessarily with the MAJOR constellations, and Genesis 49.

 

[FIRESTORM314]

No.

It was a bit of a tall order asking for Archeology remains. Just knowing people they do like to have their own identity so each tribe possibly kept their own emblem and maybe might have engraved them on buildings throughout their history, etc.

 

[FIRESTORM314]

At the local Jewish Community Center that I belong to, the flags of each tribe are hanging in the pool area. This was the only pic I could find, not great and doesn't show them all, but better than nothing I guess. You can see the lion of the tribe of Judah on the back left flag.

Lovely pool - spladooooosh - I fancy going for a swim myself after seeing that

Do you have any idea what all the symbols have been derived from ?
The Lion is obvious and I can possibly work out the meaning of a few of the others but not all of them.

 

[visionary]

 

[LaSorcia]

Lovely pool - spladooooosh - I fancy going for a swim myself after seeing that

It's a nice pool. I usually stick to the smaller, heated pool though.

Do you have any idea what all the symbols have been derived from ?

Nope, sorry.

 

[Hoshiyya]

Basically every detail you could ever want to know about the 12 banners is recorded in Jerahmeel.

Since the twelve tribes are divided into four (east, north, south, west) they can be directly correlated to essentially anything that can be grouped into four, as well as anything that can be grouped as 12. It kind of goes without saying they relate to the four elements, the four chayyot (lion, eagle, man, ox) and the twelve months of year, the only question is which specific direction or which specific tribe (out of the twelve) that corresponds to so-and-so.

So the east, led by Judah, is associated with fire. The symbol of Judah, the pre-eminent tribe in the east, is the lion, and the lion is in turn the head of the chayyot/cherubim that is facing the east and is associated with fire, making a perfect net of correlations.

The north has Dan as pre-eminent tribe, originally associated with the snake but later associated with the eagle.
the eagle head of the chayyot/cherubim is the one facing the north. and associated with the element of air.

south, tribe of reuben, symbol of a mandrake in humanoid shape, thus counting as a man for the purposes of corresponding to the human head of the cherubim. mandrakes grow in the earth, you get the point.

west, tribe of ephraim, symbol of fish, they live in the sea. if you read on you find that another symbol for the same tribe is an ox, which corresponds to the calf head of the chayyot.

The unique symbols of each individual tribe are listed in chapter LIII verse 14:

Each man stood by his standard, together with the ensign of his father's house, thus:
Reuben, mandrakes;
Simeon, the city of Shechem;
Judah, the lion's whelp;
Issachar, a strong ass;
Zebulun, a ship;
Ephraim, an ox;
Menasseh, a buffalo (or Rëem);
Benjamin, a wolf;
Dan, a serpent;
Naphtali, a hind;
Gad, a troop (according to the passage, 'a troop will overtake him');
Asher, an olive, on account of the passage, 'He dipped his foot in oil.' Thus, a sign was given to every banner, according to the deeds and according to the name of the tribe.

An interesting detail found in Jerahmeel that i've yet to find in any other text:

each direction was associated with one of the four letters of Abram (aleph-beth-resh-mem), one of the four letters of Isaac (yod-ṣadik-chet-qof) and one of the four letters Jacob (yod-ayin-qof-beth)

 

[FIRESTORM314]

Some of the Symbols seem to be derived from Genesis 49

Then Jacob called his sons and said, “Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you what shall happen to you xin days to come.

2 “Assemble and listen, O sons of Jacob,
listen to Israel your father.

3 “Reuben, you are my firstborn,
my might, and the firstfruits of my strength,
preeminent in dignity and preeminent in power.

4 Unstable as water, you shall not have preeminence,
because you went up to your father’s bed;
then you defiled it—he went up to my couch!

5 “Simeon and Levi are brothers;
weapons of violence are their swords.

6 Let my soul come not into their council;
O my glory, be not joined to their company.
For in their anger they killed men,
and in their willfulness they hamstrung oxen.
7 Cursed be their anger, for it is fierce,
and their wrath, for it is cruel!
I will divide them in Jacob
and scatter them in Israel.

8 “Judah, your brothers shall praise you;
your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies;
your father’s sons shall bow down before you.
9 Judah is a lion’s cub;
from the prey, my son, you have gone up.
lHe stooped down; he crouched as a lion
and as a lioness; who dares rouse him?
10 The scepter shall not depart from Judah,
nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet,
until tribute comes to him;
and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples.
11 Binding his foal to the vine
and his donkey’s colt to the choice vine,
he has washed his garments in wine
and his vesture in the blood of grapes.
12 His eyes are darker than wine,
and his teeth whiter than milk.

13 “Zebulun shall dwell at the shore of the sea;
he shall become a haven for ships,
and his border shall be at Sidon.

14 r“Issachar is a strong donkey,
crouching between the sheepfolds.
15 He saw that a resting place was good,
and that the land was pleasant,
so he bowed his shoulder to bear,
and became a servant at forced labor.

16 “Dan shall judge his people
as one of the tribes of Israel.
17 Dan shall be a serpent in the way,
a viper by the path,
that bites the horse’s heels
so that his rider falls backward.
18 I wait for your salvation, O Lord.
19 “Raiders shall raid Gad,
but he shall raid at their heels.

20 “Asher’s food shall be rich,
and he shall yield royal delicacies.

21 “Naphtali is a doe let loose
that bears beautiful fawns.

22 “Joseph is a fruitful bough,
a fruitful bough by a spring;
his branches run over the wall.
23 The archers bitterly attacked him,
shot at him, and harassed him severely,
24 yet his bow remained unmoved;
his arms were made agile
by the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob

(from there is the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel),

25 by the God of your father who will help you,
by the Almighty who will bless you
with blessings of heaven above,
blessings of the deep that crouches beneath,
blessings of the breasts and of the womb.
26 The blessings of your father
are mighty beyond the blessings of my parents,
up to the bounties of the everlasting hills.
May they be on the head of Joseph,
and on the brow of him who was set apart from his brothers.

27 “Benjamin is a ravenous wolf,
in the morning devouring the prey
and at evening dividing the spoil.”