State

A state is a government that holds power over a territory and the people in it, and deals with other states on their behalf. A country is the same thing. A kingdom is a state ruled by a king. In the ancient Near East nearly every state was a kingdom or a city-state (see Canaanite city-states).

Ancient kings claimed to rule by divine right: each was believed to hold his throne from his nation's god and to answer to that god alone. Sovereignty in the ancient world was not all or nothing as it is in modern law. A king could be sovereign at home and still answer to a stronger king, as a vassal (see Suzerainty).

Israel became a state when Saul was made king (1 Samuel 10-11): the nation that had existed for centuries now had a government over its land. When the northern kingdom fell in 722 BC and Judah in 586 BC, the states ended, but the nation did not. On the map, kingdoms, provinces and city-states are drawn as states. See how the map's regions are drawn.