ISRAELITES

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does Israelites mean? 

• ISRAELITES (noun)
  The noun ISRAELITES has 1 sense:

1. the ethnic group claiming descent from Abraham and Isaac (especially from Isaac's son Jacob); the nation whom God chose to receive his revelation and with whom God chose to make a covenant (Exodus 19)

  Familiarity information: ISRAELITES used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• ISRAELITES (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The ethnic group claiming descent from Abraham and Isaac (especially from Isaac's son Jacob); the nation whom God chose to receive his revelation and with whom God chose to make a covenant (Exodus 19)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Synonyms:

Hebrews; Israelites

Hypernyms ("Israelites" is a kind of...):

ethnic group; ethnos (people of the same race or nationality who share a distinctive culture)

chosen people (any people believing themselves to be chosen by God)

Domain category:

Old Testament (the collection of books comprising the sacred scripture of the Hebrews and recording their history as the chosen people; the first half of the Christian Bible)

 Context examples 

It was a rude, raw, primeval version of the Jews in Babylon or the Israelites in Egypt.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Jehovah was anthropomorphic because he could address himself to the Jews only in terms of their understanding; so he was conceived as in their own image, as a cloud, a pillar of fire, a tangible, physical something which the mind of the Israelites could grasp.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)