Aliyah is a word used to describe the immigration of Jews to Israel.

According to the Law of Moses, God promised He would gather the children of Israel back to into their land after He had scattered them, ONLY if they turned their hearts back to Him to obey all His commands (Deuteronomy 30:1-5; Leviticus 26:40-42).

The modern state of Israel, however, was established with armed force and not with repentance towards God and a commitment to obey Him. As a result of the 1948 establishment of modern Israel, there were more than an estimated 700,000 Palestinian refugees, some of which were Christians.

Since 1948, Israel has yet to become a nation representing the one true God. On the contrary, modern day Israel is a state whose religious traditions are aligned with the Jewish Talmud (a collection of rabbinical teachings which blasphemes against the Lord Jesus Christ).

In contrast to the establishment of the modern state of Israel, consider the following from the book of Nehemiah chapter 1:

1 The words of Nehemiah the son of Hachaliah. And it came to pass in the month Chisleu, in the twentieth year, as I was in Shushan the palace,

2 That Hanani, one of my brethren, came, he and certain men of Judah; and I asked them concerning the Jews that had escaped, which were left of the captivity, and concerning Jerusalem.

3 And they said unto me, The remnant that are left of the captivity there in the province are in great affliction and reproach: the wall of Jerusalem also is broken down, and the gates thereof are burned with fire.

4 And it came to pass, when I heard these words, that I sat down and wept, and mourned certain days, and fasted, and prayed before the God of heaven,

5 And said, I beseech thee, O Lord God of heaven, the great and terrible God, that keepeth covenant and mercy for them that love him and observe his commandments:

6 Let thine ear now be attentive, and thine eyes open, that thou mayest hear the prayer of thy servant, which I pray before thee now, day and night, for the children of Israel thy servants, and confess the sins of the children of Israel, which we have sinned against thee: both I and my father’s house have sinned.

7 We have dealt very corruptly against thee, and have not kept the commandments, nor the statutes, nor the judgments, which thou commandedst thy servant Moses.

8 Remember, I beseech thee, the word that thou commandedst thy servant Moses, saying, If ye transgress, I will scatter you abroad among the nations:

9 But if ye turn unto me, and keep my commandments, and do them; though there were of you cast out unto the uttermost part of the heaven, yet will I gather them from thence, and will bring them unto the place that I have chosen to set my name there.

10 Now these are thy servants and thy people, whom thou hast redeemed by thy great power, and by thy strong hand.

11 O Lord, I beseech thee, let now thine ear be attentive to the prayer of thy servant, and to the prayer of thy servants, who desire to fear thy name: and prosper, I pray thee, thy servant this day, and grant him mercy in the sight of this man. For I was the king’s cup bearer.

Notice that Nehemiah was humble and repentant, and he cited to God the conditions which God Himself had established that the people were to turn to God, to keep His commandments and to do them.

Later in Nehemiah we read the following:

The rest of the people—priests, Levites, gatekeepers, musicians, temple servants and all who separated themselves from the neighboring peoples FOR THE SAKE OF THE LAW OF GOD. together with their wives and all their sons and daughters who are able to understand— all these now join their fellow Israelites the nobles, and BIND THEMSELVES WITH A CURSE AND AN OATH to follow THE LAW OF GOD GIVEN THROUGH MOSES the servant of God and TO OBEY CAREFULLY ALL THE COMMANDS, REGULATIONS, AND DECREES of the Lord our Lord (Nehemiah 10:28-29).

These Israelites, who were returning from the Babylonian captivity, bond themselves with a curse because they were dedicating themselves to God and to the covenant God made with their fathers through Moses.

The prophet Jeremiah had foretold of this very thing when he said the following:

10 For thus saith the Lord, That after seventy years be accomplished at Babylon I will visit you, and perform my good word toward you, in causing you to return to this place.

¹¹ For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.

¹² Then shall ye call upon me, and ye shall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you.

¹³ And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.

¹⁴ And I will be found of you, saith the Lord: and I will turn away your captivity, and I will gather you from all the nations, and from all the places whither I have driven you, saith the Lord; and I will bring you again into the place whence I caused you to be carried away captive (Jeremiah 29:1-14).

This (Jeremiah’s prophecy) is exactly what happened according to the book of Nehemiah, and it happened just as it was required according to the Law of Moses, for the prerequisite for aliyah (according to the Law) is repentance towards God (Deuteronomy 30, Leviticus 26:40-42; Daniel 9:1-21; Nehemiah 1:1-11; 10:28-29 Jeremiah 29:10-14; Ezra 9:7,15).

So the questions that we must ask in all fairness is this; “Why doesn’t the aliyah of modern Israel look anything like those who returned after the Babylonian captivity?”

There simply is no doctrine or precedence in scripture which supports a Jewish national aliyah to Israel without there first being a turning of the heart towards God!