Over 2,700 years ago, the Assyrians exiled the ten tribes of the Kingdom of Israel. The ten tribes would have returned at once to the Holy Land had not the Lord encircled them with the legendary ...

That’s in v. 11, where “the tribe of Joseph” is rebranded as “the tribe of Manasseh.” Their spy, at least, carries the same pattern as ten of the others.

Joseph was Rachel’s elder son while Mordechai was a descendant of her younger son Benjamin. ... and continues as an ongoing struggle for dominance between the tribes descended from them.