Introduction

The land is a central, if not the central theme in the Bible. The land may indeed be viewed as a prism through which the life of ancient Israel is refracted in all its drama from promise to fulfilment to exile to restoration. As Walter Brueggeman observes, "It is now clear that a sense of place is a human hunger . . . And a fresh look at the Bible suggests that a sense of place is a primary category of faith."

Of course, folded into the idea of the land is the concept of "landedness," a synonym for rootedness, of being anchored in something solid and tangible, security, welfare, confidence and belonging, of what Brueggemann calls the "sense of place." Landlessness, on the other land, is synonymous with disenfrenchisement, alienation, disorientation, and loss, while exile from the land, especially, is equivalent of rejection and repudiation.

These nouns are the substance of biblical faith. It is not surprising, therefore, that the Bible, and especially of the Old Testament, is replete with concerns for land. The Hebrew word, ha'aretz, 'the land,' occurs about a thousand times in the Old Testament alone. Even if a fair portion of these are used to refer specifically to lands other than Israel, it remains plentiful. In fact, few themes are more important than the land in the Bible. An appreciation of this theme has serious consequences, shaping our biblical theology and its meaning for our lives. In particular, how we read the the prophetic literature with regards to its oracles about the future of Israel in the land, carries serious implications for how we view modern Israel and the conflict in the Middle East, and, therefore, how we pray and understand history, injustice and sorrow.