That was my point with Israel>the twelve(13)tribes. They were the Hebrews when they left Egypt (Nooo!? They couldn't have picked up any baggage there, could they have?). Then the 10 tribes did a super meld and what they left undone, the Syrians took care of, leaving Judah and Benjamin>the Jews. Ethnicity was never large on the horizon and yet there IS that connection. And, beginning with God's promise to Abraham, it was their sacred mission to introduce the rest of the world to YHWH! Which they did in one way or another, i.e. directly or in spite of themselves. When you understand this and then understand that Jesus' earthly mission was TO THE JEWS you gain a lot of insight into his parables (eg the Master's Vineyard, The Unsavory Salt, The Good Samaritan and so forth). So many times Christians have co-opted these and made it about them. There is a general sense in which they apply to anyone everywhere and yet they were really specifically to and for the Jewish people!

God's promise to Abraham that he would become the father of many nations and kings and that his descendants would be 1. like the sands of the sea and 2. like the stars in the heavens. The point here is that the sand analogy is to the earth, ethnic and physical. The children of faith which Paul(?) discusses in the NT book of Hebrews are his spiritual children, i.e. the stars! Very interesting!