Following God’s divorce of the ten-tribed house of Israel, He dispersed them among non-Israelite nations:...when the house of Israel dwelt in their own land, they defiled it by their own way and by their doings.... And I scattered them among the heathen, and they were dispersed through the countries: according to their way and according to their doings I judged them. - Ezekiel 36:17-19
Israel is swallowed up: now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure. - Hosea 8:8 Behold, the eyes of the Lord GOD are upon the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from off the face of the earth;saving that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob, saith the LORD. For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth. - Amos 9:8-9
The Kingdom represented the seat of government and God’s covenantal marriage relationship with Israel. It was this seat of government that God destroyed when He divorced her, not the people of the house of Israel. And yet for all that, when they be in the land of their enemies, I will not cast them away, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly, and to break my covenant with them: for I am the LORD their God. But I will for their sakes remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the heathen, that I might be their God: I am the LORD. - Leviticus 26:44-45
God dispersed the house of Israel throughout the nations, and eventually their identity was forgotten by the other nations: I [God] said, I would scatter them into corners, I would make the remembrance of them to cease from among men. -Deuteronomy 32:26
Although the house of Israel's identity was lost to other nations, and even to herself, God never lost sight of who she was:...O Jacob my servant; and Israel, whom I have chosen ... thou art my servant: I have formed thee.... O Israel, thou shalt not be forgotten of me. - Isaiah 44:1-21
Because of being dispersed throughout the then known world, the descendants of the house of Israel became identified as simply "goyim," the Hebrew word most often translated gentiles in the Old Testament. This change from a specific to a non-specific identity is confirmed in the New Testament. Paul identified himself and the Corinthian Christians as descendants of the Old Testament Israelites, and later he identified them as ethne, the Greek equivalent of goyim.
