Does the Land of Israel still flow with milk and honey?

“So I have come down to deliver them from the power of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey…” (Exodus 3:8)

This is God’s first description of the Promised Land in the scriptures to a family who had never been there. 

Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were promised the land for themselves and their descendants, but they were living there. They knew how good it was. Yet, after 430 years as slaves in Egypt, neither Moses nor the Israelites knew anything about the land that was promised to them. 

The first thing God wanted Israel to know about this good land was that it was flowing with milk and honey. Not places to build cities or the topography, but that their basic needs of everyday life would be more than supplied.

Later, when the 12 spies returned from spying out the land, they confirmed these same words: 

“We went into the land where you sent us, and it certainly does flow with milk and honey…” (Num 13:27)

Rather than seeing cows and bees, they saw abundant water sources that provided green places for their livestock and discovered vast groves of date palms from which much of the honey in the Bible was produced. 

Over thousands of years, God’s description of the land “flowing with milk” has not changed. Today, Israel’s dairy industry is the worldwide leader in milk production, producing more milk per cow than any other nation in the world, and teaching other nations how to improve their production. 

Ironically, this is not because Israel has the most livestock. With only 120,000 cattle, Israel’s heat, humidity and limited resources are not the best climate for dairy farms. Yet, the climate has spurred the creation of new techniques and technologies that are changing the industry. 

So, while the actual number of dairy farms in Israel has declined in recent years, milk production has continued to increase, now providing more than 80% of the nation’s demand for dairy products, valued at over $2.5 billion dollars. 

How are they doing it? Israel has bred their own type of cow, the Israeli-Holstein breed, which is best suited for the Israeli climate. The majority of cows are individually microchipped, providing farmers with real-time specific info on each cow’s overall health, weight, milk production, as well as the presence of any germs and its overall comfort in the local climate. 

As a result, Israelis have perfected a system to keep their cows comfortable year-round, even in the intense summer heat. They do not graze but are fed a specific diet of recycled natural foods that are calculated to the perfect amount and nutritional value per cow. This maximizes individual production, allowing for each cow to be milked 3 times a day, all of which increase efficiency. The results have been truly amazing, better than anywhere else on earth.

For more information or for practical firsthand experience, click here to attend Advanced Dairy Herd Management courses in Israel.

Even before Israel left Egypt, the first thing God wanted the people to know is that this good land was flowing with milk. Since the Exodus, this has never been more true than today, since the Jewish people returned to this same land and the land began to thrive. 

Today, the land is truly flowing with milk and honey. But that is what God has been telling us for thousands of years.