WI/AHC: Surviving Kingdom of Israel/Judah?

ThePest179

Banned
As it says in the title, is there any way to have a surviving Kingdom of Israel/Judah, and what would be the consequences?
 
For how long? Having any state survive untouched for 2500+ years (which is what it would take to reach present day) is very unlikely. Could they have survived the Assyrian and Babylonian conquests? Yeah, probably with the right POD, but then there's the Persians, and Alexander, and the Romans. They're going to fall to someone eventually. Having them last a little longer could have some interesting effects, but I wouldn't even know where to begin to analyze them.
 
As it says in the title, is there any way to have a surviving Kingdom of Israel/Judah, and what would be the consequences?

If you're looking for a continuity from the historic kingdoms, the world would be unrecognizable, because you'd need to butterfly away (or significantly alter) the empires of Assyria, Persia, Macedonia, Rome, etc.

Presuming you mean a later revival of the Jewish state - say after the fall of the Roman Empire - you still would have butterflied away Christianity and Judaism as we understand them. The Bar Kokhba revolt was the event which pretty much created the Jewish disaspora, along with formerly seperating Judaism and Christianity. If you butterfly away the revolt - or make it successful - you might not see either Rabbinic Judaism or Christianity as we understand it come to exist. And that's the latest possible era (before the modern era) the kingdoms could be restablished.
 
For how long? Having any state survive untouched for 2500+ years (which is what it would take to reach present day) is very unlikely. Could they have survived the Assyrian and Babylonian conquests? Yeah, probably with the right POD, but then there's the Persians, and Alexander, and the Romans. They're going to fall to someone eventually. Having them last a little longer could have some interesting effects, but I wouldn't even know where to begin to analyze them.
Maybe each time they can survive as a vassal state of some form.All of the conquerors you've mentioned aren't adverse to letting local kings remain kings as long as a portion of the taxes collected are paid towards them and that soldiers are sent on their campaigns when needed.
 
As it says in the title, is there any way to have a surviving Kingdom of Israel/Judah, and what would be the consequences?

Well, surviving for a little bit longer is possible. Here goes a scenario:
the Jewish revolt under Nero starts as in OTL with Vespasian Flavius sent to suppress it. And the Jewish war is going more or less the same as OTL but when Nero is dead the things go wrong for the Romans - one of the Western Emperors leads an army against Vespasian Flavius who proclaimed himself an emperor as well. Vespasian leaves his son Tit to besiege Jerusalem with bare minimum of troops in his disposal. All the best Eastern troops of Vespasian are moving to meet the Western Roman army and after the fierce battle Vespasian is dead and his army is defeated.
Hearing that the Jews go out of Jerusalem and massacre the Roman troops headed by Tit Flavius. The current leader of the Jews gets all the power and founds his dynasty.
The Western Emperor after his Pyrrhic victory over Vespasian is going back to Rome licking his wounds and has to deals with other revolts and barbarian invasions.
The Jewish Kingdom sees the power vacuum in the East and conquers Syria and Egypt from the Romans. As the Jewish Kingdom is a top dog now as the victors of the Romans. The Jews are smart enough to ally with the Parthians and give them Anatolia.
The main point now is to hold against Rome for 20 years till when Dacia will emerge as a great power and snatches the Balkans from the Romans.
From that moment on the Roman aggression to the East will meet the alliance of three great powers - Dacia, Parthia and the Jewish Empire.
 

jahenders

Banned
True, but the conquests could have been less destructive than they were. The Jewish kingdoms sided with others against the Assyrians and then lost, so they were treated fairly harshly, with a lot of their people transplanted into Assyria. Then, they refused to pay tribute to Babylonia and were defeated, with most of their leadership transplanted.

If, instead, they had sided with the winners and played along when weak, they would likely have been treated more leniently even in conquest. Without exiles in Assyria and Babylon, the ancient Jews would have retained more cohesion and, to some degree, a temple.

Then, if the Jews hadn't revolted against Rome, they might have avoided the Roman/Edom exile, another temple destruction, and the forced turning of Jerusalem into a pagan city.

All of that would have retained a stronger Jewish identity in one place. However, once the Muslim Jihad came in the 7th century, they might be forced to convert or have issues.

So, they could fare better, but would ultimately have lots of issues.

For how long? Having any state survive untouched for 2500+ years (which is what it would take to reach present day) is very unlikely. Could they have survived the Assyrian and Babylonian conquests? Yeah, probably with the right POD, but then there's the Persians, and Alexander, and the Romans. They're going to fall to someone eventually. Having them last a little longer could have some interesting effects, but I wouldn't even know where to begin to analyze them.
 
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