The tribe of Ephraim

occupied one of the best and most fruitful portions of the Promised Land, in its very midst (Josh. 16:1–9), and was the center of the people of Israel. Its borders were: on the west, the Mediterranean Sea; on the east, the river Jordan; on the north, part of the tribe of Manasseh; and on the south, portions of the tribes of Dan and Manasseh. The city of Shiloh lay within the borders of the tribe of Ephraim, and for this reason the whole region is sometimes called Ephraim (Jer. 31:9, 18, 20).

Here, at Shiloh, the Tabernacle was set up, and remained there for about three hundred years, until the days of the high priest Eli. Here too were the homeland and burial place of Joshua the son of Nun. Here also stood the mountains so memorable to the Hebrews, Gerizim and Ebal. Of the judges of the people of Israel, Abdon and the prophet Samuel were of Ephraim. In the blessings of Jacob and of Moses, Ephraim, or the tribe of Ephraim, is called a patient buffalo (Deut. 33:17) and a fruitful bough by a well (Gen. 49:22).

When the kingdom of Israel fell under foreign yoke, the words of the prophets concerning the tribe of Ephraim became ever more sorrowful. “I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus: Thou hast chastised me, and I was chastised, as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke” (Jer. 31:18; Hos. 10:11, 8; 4:16); “Ephraim is as an heifer that is taught, and loveth to tread out the corn” (Hos. 10:11), “a heifer of Bashan, in the mountain of Samaria” (Amos 4:1).