WHY DID GOD PICK THE LAND OF ISRAEL AS THE PROMISED LAND?

QUESTION: 

Why was Israel chosen as the promised land geographically? Perhaps it was center of the known world or maybe that’s where the most of the scattered people settled?  I was curious as to why that country. Why not Rome or Athens? Why not Egypt? Or maybe a place that’s not super-hot,
dry and difficult to get to?

ANSWER: 

The Bible doesn't given an explicit answer to why God chose the specific geographic location he did (known as Caanan or the Levant) to give to Abraham and his descendants.  But we can infer some of God’s reasons by what happened in world history.

We know it was God and not a random accident behind this land becoming the center of the Jewish story (and by proxy, much of world history).  For it was God, not Abraham, who has this specific land in mind to be the center of his redemption drama:

Abraham’s country at the time is Babylonia.  It is that land nestled between two great rivers, the Euphrates and the Tigris; hence, often called Mesopotamia (Meso –between; potamos – river).   At the time of his calling (approximately 2000 BC), this land was the place of the dominant power on earth.  It was the center of a great civilization, watered by rivers and boasting many great city states, the remains of which lie buried in modern Iraq.

FAR FROM EMPIRE

So the first reason God chose the Levant for the Promised Land is likely because it was far away from the Empires of the day.  Not only was it far from Babylonia to the East, it was far south of what would become the powerful Hittite empire to the north.  And it was far north of the Pharaoh’s of Egypt.  

So you ask why not Athens or Rome?  Moving  Abraham to this land was important because the great nations and cities of the world at that time were utterly spiritually corrupt.  After the flood, the world devolved into polytheism.  Even though pockets of humanity remembered worship of the One True God, such knowledge was fading fast.  So to preserve knowledge of God through a chosen people, it makes sense to pick a place for them to grow up, not inside but rather outside the systems of the world.  Thus, the Levant’s relative ‘backwater’ status is a feature, not a bug.

In his Foundation Trilogy Isaac Asimov writes about a future Galactic empire that is quickly falling apart.  The great scientist Hari Seldon sees its imminent collapse, so to preserve knowledge and technology, he sets up an outpost of true  learning  far from the Galactic capital so it wouldn’t be susceptible to the crash.  This is called Foundation, set up on a planet at the edge of the galaxy.  Just like this, it is likely God picks the Levant so that his redemption plan can begin unmolested by the false religion and not be attached to pride of worldly Empires.

LIVING SPACE AND JUDGMENT

Secondly, God picked the Levant because he had a double purpose in mind.  The levant is not empty when Abraham gets there.  But the inhabitants, called the Canaanites, run a particularly vile society.  God knows that in giving the land to Abraham’s kids, these locals will have to be displaced.  But in God's eyes, this displacement will be a just and timely judgment on those people’s for their entrenched wickedness.

Now, God is mercifully patient even with extreme wickedness, waiting for the Canaanites to repent.  And so, even though God gives Abraham a plot of land in Caanan, he does not possess the whole land all at once.  There will first have to be 4 hundred years where Abraham’s children move into slavery in Egypt.  

During this time, the locals, also called the Amorites, will continue on a path of self-destruction.  God patiently endures this, but when the time is right, two things will happen at once:  Abraham’s children will need a land to move into and the Canaanites sin will justify their expulsion. God spells this out in a vision to Abraham:

So, why that land?  Because God had a secondary purpose to cleanse it of evil.

STRATEGIC LOCATION

Third, God selected Canaan as the Promised Land primarily for its strategic, central location at the crossroads of three continents.  Position it in your mind’s eye: the Levant is that land bordered on the west by the eastern edge of the Mediterranean.  It runs up to Turkey, down to Egypt, extends past the Jordan river on the east.  

This means it is the only geography on planet earth that touches Asia, Africa, and Europe.  Major trade routes run right through this land. This position facilitated the spread of monotheism to the ancient world.  Remember, Israel was intended to be a "kingdom of priests" (Ex 19:6) and thus a beacon to surrounding nations.  

And when you fast forward this story to its end goal in Messiah, the geography was perfect for getting the word out to the world.  More than any other place in the world, throughout history the Levant has stood as the crossroads for conquering armies and traveling merchants to enter Africa, Asia, and Europe.

Where else could God’s message of salvation reach such a wide variety of people? Throughout Old Testament history, Israel’s location at the  crossroads of three continents allowed the nation to be a witness to the foreign travelers passing through their land. Such a prime location also provided Jesus’s disciples direct routes to take the gospel beyond “Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8 NIV).

FLOWING WITH MILK AND HONEY

As to your concern about God picking such a harsh place:  Remember that compared to Egypt, the promised land is considered “flowing with milk and honey” (Ex 3:8).  

Compared to the Pacific North Wet, Israel is very dry and finding enough fresh water is always a concern.  But it is not uniformly hot and dry in Israel.  They get snow in the Golan in winter and often in Jerusalem which is quite high in elevation.  Only 20 miles away from Jerusalem, in the Dead Sea valley, it is blisteringly hot in summer with average rainfall around 3 inches. But winters are mild there, and the northern Jezreel valley is very green and the Jordan river is lush and well-watered.  The highlands south of Jerusalem have large forests.  

The Israelites first looked at this land, not as harsh or difficult, but as a rich and opulent gift from God.