early Jewish history, in the light of modern monumental
studies,—the view, that is, which accepts the Biblical
account of Abraham and his seed as a literal family record,
authentically widening into the annals of a nation. The more
rationalizing views are indicated by the following: "There can
be no doubt … as to the Semitic character of these Hyksos,
or 'Pastors,' who, more than 2,000 years B. C., interrupted in
a measure the current of Egyptian civilisation, and founded at
Zoan (Tanis), near the Isthmus, the centre of a powerful
Semitic state. These Hyksos were to all appearances
Canaanites, near relations of the Hittites of Hebron. Hebron
was in close community with Zoan, and there is a tradition,
probably based upon historical data, that the two cities were
built nearly at the same time. As invariably happens when
barbarians enter into an ancient and powerful civilisation,
the Hyksos soon became Egyptianised. … The Hyksos of Zoan
could not fail to exercise a great influence upon the Hebrews
who were encamped around Hebron, the Dead Sea, and in the
southern districts of Palestine. The antipathy which
afterwards existed between the Hebrews and the Canaanites was
not as yet very perceptible. … There are the best of reasons
for believing that the immigration of the Beni-Israel took
place at two separate times. A first batch of Israelites seems
to have been attracted by the Hittites of Egypt, while the
bulk of the tribe was living upon the best of terms with the
Hittites of Hebron. These first immigrants found favour with
the Egyptianised Hittites of Memphis and Zoan; they secured
very good positions, had children, and constituted a distinct
family in Israel. This was what was afterwards called the
'clan of the Josephel,' or the Beni-Joseph. Finding themselves
well off in Lower Egypt, they sent for their brethren, who,
impelled perhaps by famine, joined them there, and were
received also favourably by the Hittite dynasties. These
new-comers never went to Memphis. They remained in the
vicinity of Zoan, where there is a land of Goshen, which was
allotted to them. …
{1897}
The whole of these ancient days, concerning which Israel
possesses only legends and contradictory traditions, is
enveloped in doubt; one thing, however, is certain, viz., that
Israel entered Egypt under a dynasty favourable to the
Semites, and left it under one which was hostile. The presence
of a nomad tribe upon the extreme confines of Egypt must have
been a matter of very small importance for this latter
country. There is no certain trace of it in the Egyptian
texts. The kingdom of Zoan, upon the contrary, left a deep
impression upon the Israelites. Zoan became for them
synonymous with Egypt. The relations between Zoan and Hebron
were kept up, and … Hebron was proud of the synchronism,
which made it out seven years older than Zoan. The
first-comers, the Josephites, always assumed an air of
superiority over their brethren, whose position they had been
instrumental in establishing. … Their children, born in
Egypt, possibly of Egyptian mothers, were scarcely Israelites.
An agreement was come to, however; it was agreed that the
Josephites should rank as Israelites with the rest. They
formed two distinct tribes, those of Ephraim and Manasseh. …
It is not impossible that the origin of the name of Joseph
(addition, adjunction, annexation) may have arisen from the
circumstance that the first emigrants and their families,
having become strangers to their brethren, needed some sort of
adjunction to become again part and parcel of the family of
Israel."
_E. Renan,
History of the People of Israel,
book 1, chapter 10 (volume 1)._
See, also, EGYPT: THE HYKSOS, and ABOUT B. C. 1400-1200.
JEWS:
The Route of the Exodus.
It is said of the oppressed Israelites in Egypt that "they
built for Pharaoh treasure cities, Pithom and Raamses."
(Exodus i. 11.) One of those "treasure cities," or
"store-cities," has been discovered, in a heap of ruins, at a
place which the Arabs call "Tell el Maskhutah," and it was
supposed at first to be the Raamses of the Biblical record.
But explorations made in 1883 by M. Naville seem to have
proved that it is the store-city of Pithom which lies buried
in the mounds at Tell el Maskhutah and that Raamses is still
to be found. As Raamses or Ramses was the starting point of
the Exodus, something of a controversy concerning the route of
the latter turns upon the question. It is the opinion of M.
Naville that Succoth, where the Children of Israel made their
first halt, was the district in which Pithom is situated, and
that the Land of Goshen, their dwelling-place in Egypt, was a
region embracing that district. The site of Pithom, as
identified by Naville, is "on the south side of the sweet
water canal which runs from Cairo to Suez through the Wadi
Tumilât, about 12 miles from Ismailiah." The excavations made
have brought to light a great number of chambers, with massive
walls of brick, which are conjectured to have been granaries
and storehouses, for the provisioning of caravans and armies
to cross the desert to Syria, as well as for the collecting of
tribute and for the warehousing of trade. Hence the name of
store-city, or treasure-city. Under the Greeks Pithom changed
its name to Heroopolis, and a new city called Arsinoë was
built near it.
_E. Naville,
The Store-City of Pithom._
"I submit that Goshen, properly speaking, was the land which
afterwards became the Arabian nome, viz., the country round
Saft el Henneh east of the canal Abu-I-Munagge, a district
comprising Belbeis and Abbaseh, and probably extending further
north than the Wadi Tumilat. The capital of the nome was Pa
Sopt, called by the Greeks Phacusa, now Saft el Henneh. At the
time when the Israelites occupied the land, the term 'Goshen'
belonged to a region which as yet had no definite boundaries,
and which extended with the increase of the people over the
territory they inhabited. The term 'land of Ramses' applies to
a larger area, and covers that part of the Delta which lies to
the eastward of the Tanitic branch. … As for the city of
Ramses, it was situate in the Arabian nome. Probably it was
Phacusa."
_E. Naville,
Shrine of Saft el Henneh and the Land of Goshen._
The Israelites leaving Succoth, a region which we now know
well, the neighbourhood of Tell-el-Maskhutah, push forward
towards the desert, skirting the northern shore of the gulf,
and thus reach the wilderness of Etham; but there, because of
the pursuit of Pharaoh, they have to change their course, they
are told to retrace their steps, so as to put the sea between
them and the desert. … 'And the Lord spake unto Moses,
saying: Speak unto the children of Israel that they turn and
encamp before Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea, over
against Baalzephon; before it shall ye encamp by the sea.' …
The question is now, Where are we to look for Migdol and
Pi-Hahiroth? As for Migdol, the ancient authors, and
particularly the Itinerary, mention a Migdol, or Magdolon,
which was twelve Roman miles distant from Pelusium. It is not
possible to admit that this is the same Migdol which is spoken
of in Exodus, for then it would not be the Red Sea, but the
Mediterranean, which the Israelites would have before them,
and we should thus have to fall in with MM. Schleiden and
Brugsch's theory, that they followed the narrow track which
lies between the Mediterranean and the Serbonian Bog. However
ingenious are the arguments on which this system is based, I
believe it must now be dismissed altogether, because we know
the site of the station of Succoth. Is it possible to admit
that, from the shore of the Arabian Gulf, the Israelites
turned to the north, and marched forty miles through the
desert in order to reach the Mediterranean? The journey would
have lasted several days; they would have been obliged to pass
in front of the fortresses of the north; they would have
fallen into the way of the land of the Philistines, which they
were told not to take; and, lastly, the Egyptians, issuing
from Tanis and the northern cities, would have easily
intercepted them. … All these reasons induce me to give up
definitively the idea of the passage by the north, and to
return to the old theory of a passage of the Red Sea, but of
the Red Sea as it was at that time, extending a great deal
farther northward, and not the Red Sea of to-day, which
occupies a very different position. The word Migdol, in
Egyptian, … is a common name. It means a fort, a tower. It
is very likely that in a fortified region there have been
several places so called, distinguished from each other,
either by the name of the king who built them, or by some
local circumstance; just as there are in Italy a considerable
number of Torre. I should therefore, with M. Ebers, place
Migdol at the present station of the Serapeum. There the sea
was not wide, and the water probably very shallow; there also
the phenomenon which took place on such a large scale when the
Israelites went through must have been well known, as it is
often seen now in other parts of Egypt.
{1898}
As at this point the sea was liable to be driven back under
the influence of the east wind, and to leave a dry way, the
Pharaohs were obliged to have there a fort, a Migdol, so as to
guard that part of the sea, and to prevent the Asiatics of the
desert from using this temporary gate to enter Egypt, to steal
cattle, and to plunder the fertile land which was round
Pithom."
_E. Naville,
The Store-City of Pithom and the Route of the Exodus
(Egypt Expl. Fund, 1885)._
"Modern critics prefer an intelligent interpretation,
according to known natural laws, of the words of Exodus xiv.
21, 22, which lay stress upon the 'east wind' as the direct
natural agent by which the sea bottom was for the time made
dry land. … The theory, which dates from an early period,
that the passage was in some sense tidal, miraculously aided
by the agency of wind, has thus come to be very generally
adopted."
_H. S. Palmer,
Sinai
(Ancient History from the Monuments),
chapter 6._
JEWS:
The conquest of Canaan.
"The first essay [west of Jordan] was made by Judah in
conjunction with Simeon and Levi, but was far from prosperous.
Simeon and Levi were annihilated; Judah also, though
successful in mastering the mountain land to the west of the
Dead Sea, was so only at the cost of severe losses which were
not again made up until the accession of the Kenite families
of the south (Caleb). As a consequence of the secession of
these tribes, a new division of the nation into Israel and
Judah took the place of that which had previously subsisted
between the families of Leah and Rachel; under Israel were
included all the tribes except Simeon, Levi, and Judah, which
three are no longer mentioned in Judges v., where all the
others are carefully and exhaustively enumerated. This
half-abortive first invasion of the west was followed by a
second, which was stronger and attended with much better
results. It was led by the tribe of Joseph, to which the
others attached themselves, Reuben and Gad only remaining
behind in the old settlements. The district to the north of
Judah, inhabited afterwards by Benjamin, was the first to be
attacked. It was not until after several towns of this
district had one by one fallen into the hands of the
conquerors that the Canaanites set about a united resistance.
They were, however, decisively repulsed by Joshua in the
neighbourhood of Gibeon [or Beth-horon]; and by this victory
the Israelites became masters of the whole central plateau of
Palestine. The first camp, at Gilgal, near the ford of Jordan,
which had been maintained until then, was now removed, and the
ark of Jehovah brought further inland (perhaps by way of
Bethel) to Shiloh, where henceforwards the headquarters were
fixed, in a position which seemed as if it had been expressly
made to favour attacks upon the fertile tract lying beneath it
on the north. The Bne Rachel now occupied the new territory
which up to that time had been acquired—Benjamin, in
immediate contiguity with the frontier of Judah, then Ephraim,
stretching to beyond Shiloh, and lastly Manasseh, furthest to
the north, as far as to the plain of Jezreel. The centre of
gravity, so to speak, already lay in Ephraim, to which
belonged Joshua and the ark, It is mentioned as the last
achievement of Joshua that at the waters of Merom he defeated
Jabin, king of Hazor, and the allied princes of Galilee,
thereby opening up the north for Israelitish settlers. …
Even after the united resistance of the Canaanites had been
broken, each individual community had still enough to do
before it could take firm hold of the spot which it had
searched out for itself or to which it had been assigned. The
business of effecting permanent settlement was just a
continuation of the former struggle, only on a diminished
scale; every tribe and every family now fought for its own
hand after the preliminary work had been accomplished by a
united effort. Naturally, therefore, the conquest was at first
but an incomplete one. The plain which fringed the coast was
hardly touched; so also the valley of Jezreel with its girdle
of fortified cities stretching from Acco to Bethshean. All
that was subdued in the strict sense of that word was the
mountainous land, particularly the southern hill-country of
'Mount Ephraim'; yet even here the Canaanites retained
possession of not a few cities, such as Jebus, Shechem,
Thebez. It was only after the lapse of centuries that all the
lacunæ were filled up, and the Canaanite enclaves made
tributary. The Israelites had the extraordinarily
disintegrated state of the enemy to thank for the ease with
which they had achieved success."
_J. Wellhausen,
Sketch of the History of Israel and Judah,
chapter 2._
"Remnants of the Canaanites remained everywhere among and
between the Israelites. Beside the Benjamites the Jebusites (a
tribe of the Amorites) maintained themselves, and at Gibeon,
Kirjath-jearim, Chephirah, and Beeroth were the Hivites, who
had made peace with the Israelites. In the land of Ephraim,
the Canaanites held their ground at Geser and Bethel, until
the latter—it was an important city—was stormed by the
Ephraimites. Among the tribe of Manasseh the Canaanites were
settled at Beth Shean, Dan, Taanach, Jibleam, Megiddo and
their districts, and in the northern tribes the Canaanites
were still more numerous. It was not till long after the
immigration of the Hebrews that they were made in part
tributary. The land of the Israelites beyond the Jordan, where
the tribe of Manasseh possessed the north, Gad the centre, and
Reuben the south as far as the Arnon, was exposed to the
attacks of the Ammonites and Moabites, and the migratory
tribes of the Syrian desert, and must have had the greater
attraction for them, as better pastures were to be found in
the heights of Gilead, and the valleys there were more
fruitful. To the west only the tribe of Ephraim reached the
sea, and became master of a harbourless strip of coast. The
remaining part of the coast and all the harbours remained in
the hands of the powerful cities of the Philistines and the
Phenicians. No attempt was made to conquer these, although
border-conflicts took place between the tribes of Judah, Dan,
and Asher, and Philistines and Sidonians. Such an attempt
could only have been made if the Israelites had remained
united, and even then the powers of the Israelites would
hardly have sufficed to overthrow the walls of Gaza, Ascalon,
and Ashdod, of Tyre, Sidon, and Byblus. Yet the invasion of
the Israelites was not without results for the cities of the
coast: it forced a large part of the population to assemble in
them, and we shall see … how rapid and powerful is the
growth of the strength and importance of Tyre in the time
immediately following the incursion of the Israelites, i. e.,
immediately after the middle of the thirteenth century.
{1899}
As the population and in consequence the power of the cities
on the coast increased, owing to the collection of the ancient
population on the shore of the sea, those cities became all
the more dangerous neighbours for the Israelites. It was a
misfortune for the new territory which the Israelites had won
by the sword that it was without the protection of natural
boundaries on the north and east, that the cities of the
Philistines and Phenicians barred it towards the sea, and in
the interior remnants of the Canaanites still maintained their
place. Yet it was a far more serious danger for the immigrants
that they were without unity, connection, or guidance, for
they had already given up these before the conflict was ended.
Undoubtedly a vigorous leadership in the war of conquest
against the Canaanites might have established a military
monarchy which would have provided better for the maintenance
of the borders and the security of the land than was done in
its absence. But the isolated defence made by the Canaanites
permitted the attacking party also to isolate themselves. The
new masters of the land lived, like the Canaanites before and
among them, in separate cantons; the mountain land which they
possessed was much broken up, and without any natural centre,
and though there were dangerous neighbours, there was no
single concentrated aggressive power in the neighbourhood, now
that Egypt remained in her borders. The cities of the
Philistines formed a federation merely, though a federation
far more strongly organised than the tribes of the Israelites.
Under these circumstances political unity was not an
immediately pressing question among the Israelites."
_M. Duncker,
History of Antiquity,
book 2, chapter 11 (volume 1)._
_H. Ewald,
History of Israel,
book 2, section 2, C._
JEWS:
Israel under the Judges.
The wars of the Period.
Conquest of Gilead and Bashan.
Founding of the kingdom.
"The office which gives its name to the period [between the
death of Joshua and the rise of Samuel] well describes it. It
was occasional, irregular, uncertain, yet gradually tending to
fixedness and perpetuity. Its title is itself expressive. The
Ruler was not regal, but he was more than the mere head of a
tribe, or the mere judge of special cases. We have to seek for
the origin of the name, not amongst the Sheykhs of the Arabian
desert, but amongst the civilised settlements of Phœnicia.
'Shophet,' 'Shophetim,' the Hebrew word which we translate
'Judge,' is the same as we find in the 'Suffes,' 'Suffetes,'
of the Carthaginian rulers at the time of the Punic wars. As
afterwards the office of 'king' was taken from the nations
round about, so now, if not the office, at least the name of
'judge' or 'shophet' seems to have been drawn from the
Canaanitish cities, with which for the first time Israel came
into contact. … Finally the two offices which, in the
earlier years of this period, had remained distinct—the High
Priest and the Judge—were united in the person of Eli."
_Dean Stanley,
Lectures on the History of the Jewish Church,
lecture 13._
"The first war mentioned in the days of the Judges is with the
Syrians, at a time when the Israelites, or a northern portion
of them, were held in servitude for eight years by a king
whose name, Cushan-rish-athaim, which may be translated the
'Most Wicked Negress,' seems to place him in the region of
imaginary tradition rather than of history. … The next war
mentioned was an invasion by the Moabites, who, being joined
with a body of Ammonites, and Amalakites, harassed the
Israelites of the neighbourhood of Gilgal and Jericho. …
After a servitude of 18 years under the Moabites, Ehud, a
Benjamite, found an opportunity of stabbing Eglon, the king of
Moab; and shortly afterwards the Benjamites were relieved by a
body of their neighbours from the hill country of Ephraim. The
Israelites then defeated the Moabites, and seized the fords of
the Jordan to stop their retreat, and slew them all to a man.
While this war was going on on one side of the land, the
Philistines from the south were harassing those of the
Israelites who were nearest to their country. … The history
then carries us back to the northern Israelites, and we hear
of their struggle with the Canaanites of that part of the
country which was afterwards called Galilee. These people were
under a king named Jabin, who had 900 chariots of iron, and
they cruelly oppressed the men of Naphtali and Zebulun, who
were at that time the most northerly of the Israelites. After
a suffering of 20 years, the two tribes of Zebulun and
Naphtali, under the leadership of Barak, rallied against their
oppressors, and called to their help their stronger
neighbours, the men of Ephraim. The tribe of Ephraim was the
most settled portion of the Israelites, and they had adopted
some form of government, while the other tribes were
stragglers scattered over the land, every man doing what was
right in his own eyes. The Ephraimites were at that time
governed, or, in their own language, judged, by a brave woman
of the name of Deborah, who led her followers, together with
some of the Benjamites, to the assistance of Barak, the leader
of Zebulun and Naphtali; and, at the foot of Mount Tabor, near
the brook Kishon, their united forces defeated Sisern, the
general of the Canaanites. Sisera fled, and was murdered by
Jael, a woman in whose tent he had sought for refuge. … The
next war that we are told of is an invasion by the Midianites
and Amalakites and Children of the East. They crossed the
Jordan to attack the men of Manasseh, who were at the same
time struggling with the Amorites, the natives who dwelt
amongst them. Gideon, the leader of Manasseh, called together
the fighting men of his own tribe, together with those of
Asher, Zebulun, and Naphtali. The men of Gilead, who had come
over to help him, seem to have deserted him. Gideon, however,
routed his enemies, and then he summoned the Ephraimites to
guard the fords of the Jordan, and to cut off the fugitives.
… This victory of Gideon, or Jerubbaal, as he was also
named, marked him out as a man fit to be the ruler of Israel,
and to save them from the troubles that arose from the want of
a single head to lead them against the enemies that surrounded
them and dwelt among them. Accordingly, he obtained the rank
of chief of all the northern Israelites. Gideon had dwelt at
Ophrah, in the land of Manasseh; but his son Abimelech, who
succeeded him in his high post, was born in Shechem, in the
land of Ephraim, and had thus gained the friendship of some of
that tribe. Abimelech put to death all but one of his
brethren, the other sons of Gideon, and got himself made king
at Shechem; and he was the first who bore that title among the
Israelites.
{1900}
But his thus violently seizing upon the power was the cause of
a long civil war between Ephraim and Manasseh, which ended in
the death of the usurper Abimelech, and the transfer of the
chieftainship to another tribe. Tola, a man of Issachar, was
then made Judge, or ruler of the northern tribes. … After
Tola, says the historian, Jair of Gilead judged Israel. …
Jair and his successors may have ruled in the east at the same
time that Deborah and Gideon and their successors were ruling
or struggling against their oppressors in the west. Jephtha of
Gilead is the next great captain mentioned. … The Ammonites,
who dwelt in the more desert country to the east of Gilead,
had made a serious incursion on the Israelites on both sides
of the Jordan; and the men of Gilead, in their distress, sent
for Jephtha, who was then living at Tob, in Syria, whither he
had fled from a quarrel with his brethren. … It seems that
the Ammonites invaded Gilead on the plea that they had
possessed that land before the Israelites arrived there, to
which Jephtha answered that the Israelites had dispossessed
the Amorites under Sihon, king of Heshbon, and that the
Ammonites had not dwelt in that part of the country. In
stating the argument, the historian gives a history of their
arrival on the banks of the Jordan. On coming out of Lower
Egypt, they crossed the desert to the Red Sea, and then came
to Kadesh. From thence they asked leave of the Edomites and
Moabites to pass through their territory; but, being refused,
they went round Moab till they came to the northern bank of
the river Arnon, an eastern tributary of the Jordan. There
they were attacked by Sihon, king of the Amorites; and on
defeating him they seized his territory, which lay between the
Arnon and the Jabbok. There the Israelites had dwelt quietly
for 300 years, without fighting against either the Moabites or
the Ammonites, who were both too strong to be attacked. This
is a most interesting narrative, both for what it tells and
for what it omits, as compared with the longer narrative in
the Pentateuch. … It omits all mention of the delivery of
the Law, or of the Ark, or of any supernatural events as
having happened on the march, and of the fighting with Og,
king of Bashan. Og, or Gog, as it is spelled by other writers,
was the name of the monarch whose imaginary castles, seen upon
the mountains in the distance, the traveller thought it not
wise to approach. They were at the limits of all geographical
knowledge. At this early time this fabulous king held Mount
Bashan; in Ezekiel's time he had retreated to the shores of
the Caspian Sea; and ten centuries later the Arabic travellers
were stopped by him at the foot of the Altai Mountains, in
Central Asia. His withdrawing before the advance of
geographical explorers proves his unreal character. He is not
mentioned in this earlier account of the Israelites settling
in the land of the Amorites; it is only in the more modern
narrative in the Book of Numbers that he is attacked and
defeated in battle, and only in the yet more modern Book of
Deuteronomy that we learn about his iron bedstead of nine
cubits in length."
_S. Sharpe,
History of the Hebrew Nation,
pages 4-9._
"At the close of the period of the Judges the greater part of
the Israelites had quite lost their pastoral habits. They were
an agricultural people living in cities and villages, and
their oldest civil laws I are framed for this kind of life.
All the new arts which this complete change of habit implies
they must have derived from the Canaanites, and as they
learned the ways of agricultural life they could hardly fail
to acquire many of the characteristics of their teachers. To
make the transformation complete only one thing was lacking
—that Israel should also accept the religion of the
aborigines. The history and the prophets alike testify that to
a great extent they actually did this. Canaanite sanctuaries
became Hebrew holy places, and the vileness of Canaanite
nature-worship polluted the Hebrew festivals. For a time it
seemed that Jehovah, the ancestral God of Israel, who brought
their fathers up out of the house of bondage and gave them
their goodly land, would be forgotten or transformed into a
Canaanite Baal. If this change had been completed Israel would
have left no name in the world's history; but Providence had
other things in store for the people of Jehovah. Henceforth
the real significance of Israel's fortunes lies in the
preservation and development of the national faith, and the
history of the tribes of Jacob is rightly set forth in the
Bible as the history of that divine discipline by which
Jehovah maintained a people for Himself amidst the seductions
of Canaanite worship and the ever-new backslidings of Israel.
… In the end Jehovah was still the God of Israel, and had
become the God of Israel's land. Canaan was His heritage, not
the heritage of the Baalim, and the Canaanite worship appears
henceforth, not as a direct rival to the worship of Jehovah,
but as a disturbing element corrupting the national faith,
while unable to supplant it altogether. This, of course, in
virtue of the close connection between religion and national
feeling, means that Israel had now risen above the danger of
absorption in the Canaanites, and felt itself to be a nation
in the true sense of the word. We learn from the books of
Samuel how this great advance was ultimately and permanently
secured. The earlier wars recorded in the book of Judges had
brought about no complete or lasting unity among the Hebrew
tribes. But at length a new enemy arose, more formidable than
any whom they had previously encountered. The Philistines from
Caphtor, who, like the Israelites, had entered Canaan as
emigrants, but coming most probably by sea had displaced the
aboriginal Avvim in the rich coastlands beneath the mountains
of Judah (Deuteronomy ii. 23; Amos ix. 7), pressed into the
heart of the country, and broke the old strength of Ephraim in
the battle of Ebenezer. This victory cut the Hebrew
settlements in two, and threatened the independence of all the
tribes. The common danger drew Israel together."
_W. Robertson Smith,
The Prophets of Israel,
lecture 1._
JEWS:
The Kingdoms of Israel and Judah.
"No one appeared again in the character at once of judge and
warrior, to protect the people by force of arms. It was the
Levite Samuel, a prophet dedicated to God even before his
birth, who recalled them to the consciousness of religious
feeling. He succeeded in removing the emblems of Baal and
Astarte from the heights, and in paving the way for renewed
faith in Jehovah. … It was the feeling of the people that
they could only carry on the war upon the system employed by
all their neighbors.
{1901}
They demanded a king—a request very intelligible under
existing circumstances, but one which nevertheless involved a
wide and significant departure from the impulses which had
hitherto moved the Jewish community and the forms in which it
had shaped itself. … The Israelites demanded a king, not
only to go before them and fight their battles, but also to
judge them. They no longer looked for their preservation to
the occasional efforts of the prophetic order and the
ephemeral existence of heroic leaders. … The argument by
which Samuel, as the narrative records, seeks to deter the
people from their purpose, is that the king will encroach upon
the freedom of private life which they have hitherto enjoyed,
employing their sons and daughters in his service, whether in
the palace or in war, exacting tithes, taking the best part of
the land for himself, and regarding all as his bondsmen. In
this freedom of tribal and family life lay the essence of the
Mosaic constitution. But the danger that all may be lost is so
pressing that the people insist upon their own will in
opposition to the prophet. Nevertheless, without the prophet
nothing can be done, and it is he who selects from the youth
of the country the man who is to enjoy the new dignity in
Israel. … At first the proceeding had but a doubtful result.
Many despised a young man sprung from the smallest family of
the smallest tribe of Israel, as one who could give them no
real assistance. In order to make effective the conception of
the kingly office thus assigned to him, it was necessary in
the first place that he should gain for himself a personal
reputation. A king of the Ammonites, a tribe in affinity to
Israel, laid siege to Jabesh in Gilead, and burdened the
proffered surrender of the place with the condition that he
should put out the right eyes of the inhabitants. … Saul,
the son of Kish, a Benjamite, designated by the prophet as
king, but not as yet recognized as such, was engaged, as
Gideon before him, in his rustic labors, when he learned the
situation through the lamentations of the people. … Seized
with the idea of his mission, Saul cuts in pieces a yoke of
oxen, and sends the portions to the twelve tribes with the
threat, 'Whosoever cometh not forth after Saul and after
Samuel, so shall it be done unto his oxen.' … Thus urged,
… Israel combines like one man; Jabesh is rescued and Saul
acknowledged as king. … With the recognition of the king,
however, and the progress of his good-fortune, a new and
disturbing element appears. A contest breaks out between him
and the prophet, in which we recognize not so much opposition
as jealousy between the two powers. … On the one side was
the independent power of monarchy, which looks to the
requirements of the moment, on the other the prophet's
tenacious and unreserved adherence to tradition. … The
relations between the tribes have also some bearing on the
question. Hitherto Ephraim had led the van, and jealously
insisted on its prerogative. Saul was of Benjamin, a tribe
nearly related to Ephraim by descent. He had made the men of
his own tribe captains, and had given them vineyards. On the
other hand, the prophet chose Saul's successor from the tribe
of Judah. This successor was David, the son of Jesse. … In
the opposition which now begins we have on the one side the
prophet and his anointed, who aim at maintaining the religious
authority in all its aspects, on the other the champion and
deliverer of the nation, who, abandoned by the faithful, turns
for aid to the powers of darkness and seeks knowledge of the
future through witchcraft. Saul is the first tragic personage
in the history of the world. David took refuge with the
Philistines. Among them he lived as an independent military
chieftain, and was joined not only by opponents of the king,
but by others, ready for any service, or, in the language of
the original, 'men armed with bows, who could use both the
right hand and the left in hurling stones and shooting arrows
out of a bow.' … In any serious war against the Israelites,
such as actually broke out, the Sarim of the Philistines would
not have tolerated him amongst them. David preferred to engage
in a second attack upon the Amalekites, the common enemy of
Philistines and Jews. At this juncture Israel was defeated by
the Philistines. The king's sons were slain; Saul, in danger
of falling into the enemy's hands, slew himself. Meanwhile
David with his freebooters had defeated the Amalekites, and
torn from their grasp the spoil they had accumulated, which
was now distributed in Judah. Soon after, the death of Saul is
announced. … David, conscious of being the rightful
successor of Saul—for on him too, long ere this, the unction
had been bestowed—betook himself to Hebron, the seat of the
ancient Canaanitish kings, which had subsequently been given
up to the priests and made one of the cities of refuge. It was
in the province of Judah; and there, the tribe of Judah
assisting at the ceremony, David was once more anointed. This
tribe alone, however, acknowledged him; the others, especially
Ephraim and Benjamin, attached themselves to Ishbosheth, the
surviving son of Saul. … The first passage of arms between
the two hosts took place between twelve of the tribe of
Benjamin and twelve of David's men-at-arms. It led, however,
to no result; it was a mutual slaughter, so complete as to
leave no survivor. But in the more serious struggle which
succeeded this the troops of David, trained as they were in
warlike undertakings of great daring as well as variety, won
the victory over Ishbosheth; and as the unanointed king could
not rely upon the complete obedience of his
commander-in-chief, who considered himself as important as his
master, David, step by step, won the upper hand. … The
Benjamites had been the heart and soul of the opposition which
David experienced. Nevertheless, the first action which he
undertook as acknowledged king of all the tribes redounded
specially to their advantage, whilst it was at the same time a
task of the utmost importance for the whole Israelitish
commonwealth. Although Joshua had conquered the Amorites, one
of their strongholds, Jebus, still remained unsubdued, and the
Benjamites had exerted all their strength against it in vain.
It was to this point that David next directed his victorious
arms. Having conquered the place, he transferred the seat of
his kingdom thither without delay [see JERUSALEM]. This seat
is Jerusalem; the word Zion has the same meaning as Jebus."
_L. von Ranke,
Universal History:
The Oldest Historical Groups of Nations,
chapter 2._
{1902}
"After Saul's death it was at first only in Judah, where David
maintained his government, that a new Kingdom of Israel could be
established at all, so disastrous were the consequences of the
great Philistine victory. The Philistines, who must have already
conquered the central territory, now occupied that to the
north, also, while the inhabitants of the cities of the great
plain of Jezreel and of the western bank of the Jordan, fled,
we are very distinctly informed, across the river."
_H. Ewald,
History of Israel,
book 3._
But Abner, the strong warrior and the faithful kinsman of
Saul's family, took Ishbosheth, the oldest surviving son of
his dead king, and throned him in the city of Mahanaim, beyond
the Jordan, proceeding gradually to gather a kingdom for him
by reconquest from the Philistines. Thus the Israelite nation
was first divided into the two kingdoms of Israel and Judah,
and there was bitter war between them. But that first division
was not to endure long. Abner and Ishbosheth fell victims to
treachery, and the tribes which had held by them offered
allegiance to David, who then became king over "all Israel and
Judah." By the conquest of the city of Jebus from its
Canaanite founders and possessors, he acquired a new,
impregnable capital, which, under the name of Jerusalem, grew
to be the most reverently looked upon of all the cities of the
world. "History has been completely distorted in representing
David as the head of a powerful kingdom, which embraced nearly
the whole of Syria. David was king of Judah and of Israel, and
that was all; the neighboring peoples, Hebrews, Canaanites,
Arameans and Philistines, as far as Mahul Hermon and the
desert, were sternly subjected, and were more or less its
tributaries. In reality, with the exception, perhaps, of the
small town of Ziklag, David did not annex any non-Israelite
country to the domain of Israel. The Philistines, the
Edomites, the Moabites, the Ammonites, and the Arameans of
Zoba, of Damascus, of Rehob and of Maacah were, after his day,
very much what they were before, only a little weaker.
Conquest was not a characteristic of Israel; the taking
possession of the Canaanite lands was an act of a different
order, and it came to be more and more regarded as the
execution of a decree of Iahveh. As this decree did not extend
to the lands of Edom, of Moab, of Ammon and of Aram, the
Israelites deemed themselves justified in treating the
Edomites, the Moabites, the Ammonites and the Arameans with
the utmost severity, in carrying off their precious stones and
objects of price, but not in taking their land, or in changing
their dynasty. None of the methods employed by great empires
such as Assyria was known to these small peoples, which had
scarcely got beyond the status of tribes. They were as cruel
as Assur, but much less politic and less capable of a general
plan. The impression produced by the appearance of this new
royalty was none the less extraordinary. The halo of glory
which enveloped David remained like a star upon the forehead
of Israel."
_E. Renan,
History of the People of Israel,
book 3, chapter 4 (volume 2)._
David died about 1000 B. C. and was succeeded by his son
Solomon, whose mother, Bathsheba, secured the throne for him
by intrigue. "Solomon was a younger son, to whom the throne
had been allotted contrary to ordinary laws of succession,
whilst Adonijah, whom a portion of the people had recognised
as king, was considered the rightful heir. So long as the
latter lived. Solomon's government could not be on a firm
basis, and he could never feel himself secure. Adonijah had
therefore to be removed; the leader of the body guard,
Benaiah, forcibly entered his house and killed him. As an
excuse for this act of violence, it was asserted that Adonijah
had attempted to win the hand of Abishag, the young widow of
David, and thus had revealed his traitorous intention of
contesting the throne with his brother. No sooner had he
fallen than Joab, the former adherent of Adonijah, feared that
a similar fate would overtake him. This exemplary general, who
had contributed so considerably to the aggrandisement of the
people of Israel and to the power of the house of David, fled
to the altar on Mount Zion, and clung to it, hoping to escape
death. Benaiah, however, refused to respect his place of
refuge, and shed his blood at the altar. In order to excuse
this crime, it was circulated that David himself, on his
death-bed, had impressed on his successor the duty of
preventing Joab's grey head from sinking in peace to its last
rest. … Adonijah's priestly partisan, Abiathar, whom Solomon
did not dare to touch, was deprived of his office as high
priest, and Zadok was made the sole head of the priesthood.
His descendants were invested with the dignity of high priest
for over a thousand years, whilst the offspring of Abiathar
were neglected. The Benjamite Shimei, who had attacked David
with execrations on his flight from Jerusalem, was also
executed, and it was only through this three-fold deed of
blood that Solomon's throne appeared to gain stability.
Solomon then directed his attention to the formation of a
court of the greatest magnificence."
_H. Graetz,
History of the Jews,
volume 1, chapter 9._
"The main characteristic of Solomon's reign was peace. The
Philistines, allies of the new dynasty, and given profitable
employment by it as mercenaries, were no longer tempted to
cross the frontier. … The decay of military strength was
only felt in the zone of countries which were tributary to the
kingdom. Hadad, or Hadar, the Edomite, who had been defeated
by Joab and had taken refuge in Egypt, having heard of David's
death, and that of Joab as well, left Pharaoh, whose
sister-in-law he had married. We have no details of this war.
… We only know that Hadad braved Israel throughout the whole
of Solomon's reign, that he did it all the injury he could,
and that he was an independent ruler over a great part at all
events of Edom. A still more formidable adversary was Rezon,
son of Eliadah, an Aramean warrior who, after the defeat of
his lord, Hadadezer, king of Zobah, had assembled about him
those who had fled before the sword of David. … A lucky
'coup-de-main' placed the city of Damascus at their mercy, and
they succeeded in maintaining themselves there. During the
whole of Solomon's reign Rezon continued to make war against
Israel. The kingdom of Zobah does not appear, however, to have
been re-established. Damascus became henceforth the centre and
capital of that part of Aramea which adjoined Mount Hermon.
David's horizon never extended beyond Syria. With Solomon,
fresh perspectives opened up for the Israelites, especially
for Jerusalem. Israel is no longer a group of tribes,
continuing to lead in its mountains the patriarchal life of
the past. It is a well-organised kingdom, small according to
our ideas, but rather large judged by the standard of the day.
The worldly life of the people of Iahveh is about to begin. If
Israel had no other life but that it would not have found a
place in history. … An alliance with Egypt was the first
step in that career of profane politics which the prophets
afterwards interlarded with so much that was impossible. …
{1903}
The king of Egypt gave Gezer as a dowry to his daughter, and
married her to Solomon. … It is not too much to suppose that
the tastes of this princess for refined luxury had a great
influence upon the mind of her husband. … The relations of
Solomon with Tyre exercised a still more civilising influence.
Tyre, recently separated from Sidon, was then at the zenith of
its activity, and, so to speak, in the full fire of its first
foundation. A dynasty of kings named Hiram, or rather Ahiram,
was at the head of this movement. The island was covered with
constructions imitated from Egypt. … Hiram is the close ally
of the king of Israel; it is he who provides Solomon with the
artists who were lacking at Jerusalem; the precious materials
for the buildings in Zion; seamen for the fleet of Eziongeber.
The region of the upper Jordan, conquered by David, appears to
have remained tributary to Solomon. What has been related as
to a much larger extension of the kingdom of Solomon is
greatly exaggerated. … The fables as to the pretended
foundation of Palmyra by Solomon come from a letter
intentionally added to the text of the ancient historiographer
by the compiler of the Chronicles. The construction of Baalbec
by Solomon rests upon a still more inadmissible piece of
identification. … In reality, the dominion of Solomon was
confined to Palestine. … What was better than peoples kept
under by force, the Arab brigands were held in check from
pillage. The Amalekites, the Midianites, the Beni-Quedem and
other nomads were confronted with an impassable barrier all
around Israel. The Philistines preserved their independence.
… When it is surmised that Solomon reigned over all Syria,
the size of his kingdom is exaggerated at least fourfold.
Solomon's kingdom was barely a fourth of what is now called
Syria. … Solomon … built 'cities of store,' or warehouses,
the commercial or military object of which cannot well be
defined. There was, more especially, a place named Tamar, in
the direction of Petra, of which Solomon made a city, and
which became a calling-place for the caravans. … With very
good reason, too, Solomon had his attention constantly fixed
upon the Red Sea, a broad canal which placed the dawning
civilisation of the Mediterranean in communication with India,
and thus opened up a new world, that of Ophir. The Bay of Suez
belonged to Egypt, but the Gulf of Akaba was, one may say, at
the mercy of anyone who cared to take it. Elath and
Asiongaber, according to all appearances, had been of very
little importance in earlier times. Without regularly
occupying the country, Solomon secured the route by the Valley
of Araba. He built a fleet at Asiongaber, though the
Israelites had never much liking for the sea. Hiram provided
Solomon with sailors, or, what is more probable, the two
fleets acted together. On leaving the Straits of Aden, they
went to Ophir, that is to say, to Western India, to Guzarate,
or to the coast of Malabar."
E_. Renan,
History of the People of Israel,
book 3, chapter 10 (volume 2)._
The government of Solomon was extravagant and despotic; it
imposed burdens upon the people which were borne impatiently
until his death; and when his son Rehoboam refused to lessen
them, the nation was instantly broken again on the lines of
the earlier rupture. The two tribes of Judah and Benjamin,
only, remained faithful to the house of David and constituted
the kingdom of Judah. The other ten tribes made Jeroboam their
king and retained the name of Israel for their kingdom. The
period of this division is fixed at 978 B. C. Jerusalem
continued to be the capital of the kingdom of Judah. In the
kingdom of Israel several changes of royal residence occurred
during the first half century, until Samaria was founded by
King Omri and thenceforth became the capital city. "Six miles
from Shechem, in the same well-watered valley, here opening
into a wide basin, rises an oblong hill, with steep yet
accessible sides, and a long level top. This was the mountain
of Samaria, or, as it is called in the original, Shômeron, so
named after its owner Shemer, who there lived in state, and
who sold it to the King for the great sum of two talents of
silver."
_Dean Stanley,
Lectures on the History of the Jewish Church,
lectures 29-30 (volume 2)._
For two centuries, until the overthrow of the kingdom, Samaria
continued to be the queen of the land, and the seat of
government, often giving its name to the whole state, so that
the kings were called "Kings of Samaria." "Under the dynasties
of Omri and Jehu [10th-8th centuries, B. C.] the Northern
Kingdom took the leading part in Israel; even to the Judæan
Amos it was Israel 'par excellence.' Judah was not only
inferior in political power, but in the share it took in the
active movements of national life and thought. In tracing the
history of religion and the work of the prophets, we have been
almost exclusively occupied with the North; Amos himself, when
charged with a message to the whole family that Jehovah
brought up out of Egypt, leaves his home to preach in a
Northern sanctuary. During this whole period we have a much
fuller knowledge of the life of Ephraim than of Judah; the
Judæan history consists of meagre extracts from official
records, except where it comes into contact with the North,
through the alliance of Jehoshaphat with Ahab; through the
reaction of Jehu's revolution in the fall of Athaliah, the
last scion of the house of Ahab, and the accompanying
abolition of Baal worship at Jerusalem, or, finally, through
the presumptuous attempt of Amaziah to measure his strength
with the powerful monarch of Samaria. While the house of
Ephraim was engaged in the great war with Syria, Judah had
seldom to deal with enemies more formidable than the
Philistines or the Edomites; and the contest with these foes,
renewed with varying success generation after generation,
resolved itself into a succession of forays and blood-feuds
such as have always been common in the lands of the Semites
(Amos i.), and never assumed the character of a struggle for
national existence. It was the Northern Kingdom that had the
task of upholding the standard of Israel; its whole history
presents greater interest and more heroic elements; its
struggles, its calamities, and its glories were cast in a
larger mould. It is a trite proverb that the nation which has
no history is happy, and perhaps the course of Judah's
existence ran more smoothly than that of its greater neighbor,
in spite of the raids of the slave-dealers of the coast, and
the lawless hordes of the desert. But no side of national
existence is likely to find full development where there is
little political activity; if the life of the North was more
troubled, it was also larger and more intense.
{1904}
Ephraim took the lead in literature and religion as well as in
politics; it was in Ephraim far more than in Judah that the
traditions of past history were cherished, and new problems of
religion became practical and called for solution by the word
of the prophets. So long as the Northern Kingdom endured Judah
was content to learn from it for evil or for good. It would be
easy to show in detail that every wave of life and thought in
Ephraim was transmitted with diminished intensity to the
Southern Kingdom. In many respects the influence of Ephraim
upon Judah was similar to that of England upon Scotland before
the union of the crowns, but with the important difference
that after the accession of Omri the two Hebrew kingdoms were
seldom involved in hostilities. … The internal condition of
the [Judæan] state was stable, though little progressive; the
kings were fairly successful in war, though not sufficiently
strong to maintain unbroken authority over Edom, the only
vassal state of the old Davidic realm over which they still
claimed suzerainty, and their civil administration must have
been generally satisfactory according to the not very high
standard of the East; for they retained the affections of
their people, the justice and mercy of the throne of David are
favourably spoken of in the old prophecy against Moab quoted
in Isaiah XV., xvi., and Isaiah contrasts the disorders of his
own time with the ancient reputation of Jerusalem for fidelity
and justice (i. 21). … The religious conduct of the house of
David followed the same general lines. Old abuses remained
untouched, but the cultus remained much as David and Solomon
had left it. Local high places were numerous, and no attempt
was made to interfere with them; but the great temple on Mount
Zion, which formed part of the complex of royal buildings
erected by Solomon, maintained its prestige, and appears to
have been a special object of solicitude to the kings, who
treated its service as part of their royal state. It is common
to imagine that the religious condition of Judah was very much
superior to that of the North, but there is absolutely no
evidence to support this opinion."
_W. Robertson Smith,
The Prophets of Israel,
lecture 5._
In the year B. C. 745 the throne of Assyria was seized by a
soldier of great ability, called Pul, or Pulu, who took the
name of Tiglath-pileser III. and who promptly entered on an
ambitious career of conquest, with imperial aims and plans.
"In B. C. 738 we find him receiving tribute from Menahem of
Samaria, Rezon of Damascus, and Hiram of Tyre. … The throne
of Israel was occupied at the time by Pekah, a successful
general who had murdered his predecessor, but who was
evidently a man of vigour and ability. He and Rezon
endeavoured to form a confederacy of the Syrian and
Palestinian states against their common Assyrian foe. In order
to effect their object they considered it necessary to
displace the reigning king of Judah, Ahaz, and substitute for
him a creature of their own. … They were aided by a party of
malcontents in Judah itself (Isaiah viii. 6), and the position
of Ahaz seemed desperate. … In this moment of peril Isaiah
was instructed to meet and comfort Ahaz. He bade him 'fear
not, neither be fainthearted,' for the confederacy against the
dynasty of David should be broken and overthrown. … But Ahaz
… had no faith either in the prophet or in the message he
was commissioned to deliver. He saw safety in one course
only—that of invoking the assistance of the Assyrian king,
and bribing him by the offer of homage and tribute to march
against his enemies. In vain Isaiah denounced so suicidal and
unpatriotic a policy. In vain he foretold that when Damascus
and Samaria had been crushed, the next victim of the Assyrian
king would be Judah itself. The infatuated Ahaz would not
listen. He 'sent messengers to Tiglath-pileser king of
Assyria, saying, I am thy servant and thy son: come up and
save me out of the hand of the king of Syria, and out of the
hand of the king of Israel, which rise up against me.'" The
king of Assyria responded to the call (B. C. 734). He defeated
Rezon in battle, laid siege to Damascus, swept the tribes east
of the Jordan into captivity, overran the territory of Israel,
captured Samaria and put to death Pekah the king. In place of
Pekah he set up a vassal-king Hoshea. Six years later,
Tiglath-pileser having died, and the Assyrian throne having
been seized by another strong soldier, Shalmaneser IV., Hoshea
attempted a revolt, looking to Egypt for help. But before
Sabako king of Egypt could move to his assistance, "Hoshea was
defeated by the Assyrian king or his satraps, and thrown into
chains. The ruling classes of Samaria, however, still held
out. An Assyrian army, accordingly, once more devastated the
land of Israel, and laid siege to the capital. For three years
Samaria remained untaken. Another revolution had meanwhile
broken out in Assyria; Shalmaneser had died or been put to
death, and a fresh military adventurer had seized the crown,
taking the name of Sargon, after a famous monarch of ancient
Babylonia. Sargon had hardly established himself upon the
throne when Samaria fell (B. C. 722). … He contented himself
with transporting only 27,280 of its inhabitants into
captivity, only the upper classes, in fact, who were
implicated in the revolt of Hoshea. An Assyrian satrap, or
governor, was appointed over Samaria, while the bulk of the
population was allowed to remain peaceably in their old
homes."
_A. H. Sayce,
Life and Times of Isaiah,
chapter 3._
"Much light is thrown upon the conditions of the national
religion then and upon its subsequent development by the
single fact that the exiled Israelites were absorbed by the
surrounding heathenism without leaving a trace behind them,
while the population of Judah, who had the benefit of a
hundred years of respite, held their faith fast throughout the
period of the Babylonian exile, and by means of it were able
to maintain their own individuality afterwards in all the
circumstances that arose. The fact that the fall of Samaria
did not hinder but helped the religion of Jehovah is entirely
due to the prophets."
_J. Wellhausen,
Sketch of the History of Israel and Judah,
chapter 6._
"The first generation of the exiles lived to see the fall of
their conquerors. … After this it is difficult to discover
any distinct trace of the northern tribes. Some returned with
their countrymen of the southern kingdom. … The immense
Jewish population which made Babylonia a second Palestine was
in part derived from them; and the Jewish customs that have
been discovered in the Nestorian Christians, with the
traditions of the sect itself, may indicate at any rate a
mixture of Jewish descent. That they [the 'lost Ten Tribes']
are concealed in some unknown region of the earth, is a fable
with no foundation either in history or prophecy."
_Dean Stanley,
Lectures on the History of the Jewish Church,
lecture 34 (volume 2)._
See, also, JERUSALEM.
{1905}
JEWS: B. C. 724-604.
The kingdom of Judah to the end of the Egyptian domination.
Three years before Sargon's destruction of Samaria, "Hezekiah
had succeeded his father Ahaz upon the throne of Jerusalem.
… Judah was tributary to Assyria, and owed to Assyria its
deliverance from a great danger. But the deliverer and his
designs were extremely dangerous, and made Judah apprehensive
of being swallowed up presently, when its turn came. The
neighbouring countries,—Phœnicia on the north, Moab, Ammon,
and the Arabian nations on the east, Philistia on the west,
Egypt and Ethiopia on the south,—shared Judah's
apprehensions. There were risings, and they were sternly
quelled; Judah, however, remained tranquil. But the scheme of
an anti-Assyrian alliance was gradually becoming popular.
Egypt was the great pillar of hope. By its size, wealth,
resources, pretensions, and fame, Egypt seemed a possible
rival to Assyria. Time went on. Sargon was murdered in 705;
Sennacherib succeeded him. Then on all sides there was an
explosion of revolts against the Assyrian rule. The first
years of Sennacherib's reign were spent by him in quelling a
formidable rising of Merodach Baladan, king of Babylon. The
court and ministers of Hezekiah seized this opportunity for
detaching their master from Assyria, for joining in the
movement of the insurgent states of Palestine and its borders,
and for allying themselves with Egypt. … In the year 701,
Sennacherib, victorious in Babylonia, marched upon Palestine."
_M. Arnold,
Isaiah of Jerusalem,
introduction._
Sennacherib advanced along the Phœnician coast. "Having
captured Ascalon, he next laid siege to Ekron, which, after
the Egyptian army sent to its relief had been defeated at
Eltekeh, fell into the enemy's hand, and was severely dealt
with. Simultaneously various fortresses of Judah were
occupied, and the level country was devastated (Isaiah i.).
The consequence was that Hezekiah, in a state of panic,
offered to the Assyrians his submission, which was accepted on
payment of a heavy penalty, he being permitted, however, to
retain possession of Jerusalem. He seemed to have got cheaply
off from the unequal contest. The way being thus cleared,
Sennacherib pressed on southwards, for the Egyptians were
collecting their forces against him. The nearer he came to the
enemy the more undesirable did he find it that he should leave
in his rear so important a fortress as Jerusalem in the hands
of a doubtful vassal. Notwithstanding the recently ratified
treaty, therefore, he demanded the surrender of the city,
believing that a policy of intimidation would be enough to
secure it from Hezekiah. But there was another personality in
Jerusalem of whom his plans had taken no account. Isaiah had
indeed regarded the revolt from Assyria as a rebellion against
Jehovah Himself, and therefore as a perfectly hopeless
undertaking, which could only result in the utmost humiliation
and sternest chastisement for Judah. But much more distinctly
than Amos and Hosea before him did he hold firm as an article
of faith the conviction that the kingdom would not be utterly
annihilated; all his speeches of solemn warning closed with
the announcement that a remnant should return and form the
kernel of a new commonwealth to be fashioned after Jehovah's
own heart. … Over against the vain confidence of the
multitude Isaiah had hitherto brought into prominence the
darker obverse of his religious belief, but now he confronted
their present depression with its bright reverse;
faintheartedness was still more alien to his nature than
temerity. In the name of Jehovah he bade King Hezekiah be of
good courage, and urged that he should by no means surrender.
The Assyrians would not be able to take the city, not even to
shoot an arrow into it, nor to bring up their siege train
against it. 'I know thy sitting, thy going, and thy standing,'
is Jehovah's language to the Assyrian, 'and also thy rage
against Me. And I will put my ring in thy nose, and my bridle
in thy lips, and I will turn thee back by the way by which
thou camest.' And thus it proved in the issue. By a still
unexplained catastrophe, the main army of Sennacherib was
annihilated on the frontier between Egypt and Palestine, and
Jerusalem thereby freed from all danger. The Assyrian king had
to save himself by a hurried retreat to Nineveh; Isaiah was
triumphant. A more magnificent close of a period of
influential public life can hardly be imagined."
_J. Wellhausen,
Sketch of the History of Israel and Judah,
chapter 7._
"We possess in duplicate, on the Taylor Cylinder, found at
Nineveh in 1830, and now in the British Museum, and on the
Bull-inscription of Kouyunjik, Sennacherib's own account of
the stages of his campaign. Sidon and the cities of Phœnicia
were the first to be attacked; and, after reducing these, and
receiving homage from several of the kings of the countries
bordering on Palestine, who apparently were not this time
implicated in the plan of revolt, Sennacherib started
southwards, aiming to recover similarly Ashkelon, Ekron, and
Jerusalem. In Ashkelon he deprived Zedek of his crown, which
he bestowed upon Sarludari, the son of a former king,
doubtless on the ground that he was friendly to Assyrian
interests: at the same time four subject-cities belonging to
Zedek, Beth-dagon, Joppa, Bene-Barak, and Azuru were captured
and plundered. Sennacherib next proceeds to deal with Ekron.
The people of Ekron, in order to carry through their plan for
the recovery of independence without hindrance, had deposed
their king Padi, who remained loyal to Assyria, and sent him
bound in chains to Hezekiah. Upon news of the approach of the
Assyrians, they had summoned the Egyptians to their aid; they
arrive now 'with forces innumerable;' the encounter takes
place at Altaku (probably not far from Ekron); victory
declares for the Assyrian; and the Egyptians retire without
effecting the desired relief. After this Sennacherib soon
reduces Ekron; he obtains, moreover, the surrender of Padi
from Jerusalem, and restores him to his throne. Now follows
the account of the aggressive measures adopted by him against
Judah and Jerusalem. 'And Hezekiah of Judah, who had not
submitted to my yoke, forty-six of his strong cities,
fortresses and smaller towns round about their border without
number, with laying low of the walls, and with open (?)
attack, with battle … of feet, … hewing about and
trampling down (?), I besieged, I took 200,150 people, small
and great, male and female, horses, mules,' asses, camels,
oxen, and sheep without number, from the midst of them I
brought out, and I counted them as spoil.
{1906}
Himself, as a bird in a cage, in the midst of Jerusalem, his
royal city, I shut up. Siege-works against him I erected, and
the exit of the great gate of his city I blocked up. His
cities which I had plundered, from his domain I cut off; and
to Mitinti, king of Ashdod, to Padi, king of Ekron, and to
Zilbel, king of Gaza, I gave them; I diminished his territory.
To the former payment of their yearly tribute, the tribute of
subjection to my sovereignty I added; I laid it upon them.
Himself, Hezekiah, the terror of the splendour of my
sovereignty overwhelmed: the Arabians and his dependents, whom
he had introduced, for the defence of Jerusalem, his royal
city, and to whom he had granted pay, together with 30 talents
of gold, 800 talents of silver, bullion (?) … precious (?)
stones of large size, couches of ivory, lofty thrones of
ivory, elephant-skins, ivory, … wood, … woods of every
kind, an abundant treasure, and in addition, his daughters,
the women of his palace, his male and female
harem(?)-attendants unto Nineveh, my royal city, he caused to
be brought after me. For the payment of tribute, and the
rendering of homage: he sent his envoy.' Here the account on
the Inscription closes, the lines which follow relating to the
campaign of the subsequent year."
_S. R. Driver,
Isaiah: His Life and Times,
chapter 7._
"Between the retreat of Sennacherib's army and the capture of
the capital by Nebuchadrezzar there was an interval of little
more than a century, yet, meanwhile, upon the basis of the
prophetical teaching, the foundations of Judaism were laid.
… But though Sennacherib had retreated from Palestine, Judah
still remained the vassal of Assyria. The empire of Assyria
was scarcely affected by the event which was to change the
face of the world, and for more than half-a-century its power
was undiminished and supreme. Yet, as regards the internal
condition of Judah, the great deliverance was the occasion of
a reform which at first may well have made Isaiah's heart beat
high. … Influential as he was at the court and with the
king, and with reputation enormously enhanced by the
fulfilment of his promise of deliverance, he probably urged
and prompted Hezekiah to the execution of a religious reform.
The meagre verse in the Book of Kings which describes this
reform is both inaccurate and misplaced. There is no hint in
the authentic writings of Isaiah or Micah that any religious
innovations had been attempted before the Assyrian war. It was
the startling issue of Sennacherib's invasion which afforded
the opportunity and suggested the idea. Moreover, wider
changes are attributed to Hezekiah than he can actually have
effected. … The residuum of fact contained in the 18th
chapter of the Second Book of Kings must be probably limited
to the destruction of the Nehushtan, or brazen serpent, that
mysterious image in which the contemporaries of Hezekiah,
whatever may have been its original signification, doubtless
recognized a symbol of Yahveh. Yet indirect evidence would
incline us to believe that Hezekiah's reform involved more
than the annihilation of a single idol; it is more probably to
be regarded as an attempt at a general abolition of images, as
well as a suppression of the new Assyrian star-worship and of
the 'Moloch' sacrifices which had been introduced into Judah
in the reign of Ahaz. Whether this material iconoclasm
betokened or generated any wide moral reformation is more than
doubtful. … Hezekiah's reign extended for about fourteen
years after the deliverance of Jerusalem in 701. To the early
part of this, its second division, the religious reformation
must be assigned. A successful campaign against the
Philistines, alluded to in the Book of Kings, probably fell
within the same period. Beyond this, we know nothing, though
we would gladly know much, of these fourteen concluding years
of an eventful reign. In 686 Hezekiah died, and was succeeded
by his son Manasseh, who occupied the throne for forty-five
years (686-641). The Book of Kings does not record a single
external incident throughout his long reign. It must have been
a time of profound peace and of comparative prosperity.
Manasseh remained the vassal of Assyria, and the Assyrian
inscriptions speak of him as paying tribute to the two kings,
Esarhaddon (681-669), Sennacherib's successor, and Asurbanipal
(669-626), till whose death the supremacy of Assyria in
Palestine was wholly undisputed. Uneventful as Manasseh's
reign was in foreign politics, it was all the more important
in its internal and religious history. In it, and in the short
reign of Amon, who maintained the policy of his father, there
set in a period of strong religious reaction, extending over
nearly half-a-century (686-638). Manasseh is singled out by
the historian for special and repeated reprobation. In the
eyes of the exilic redactor, his iniquities were the immediate
cause of the destruction of the national life. Not even
Josiah's reformation could turn Yahveh 'from the fierceness of
his great wrath, wherewith his anger was kindled against
Judah, because of all the provocations that Manasseh had
provoked him withal.' Jeremiah had said the same. Exile and
dispersion are to come 'because of Manasseh, the son of
Hezekiah, king of Judah, for that which he did in Jerusalem.'
… What were the sins of Manasseh? It has already been
indicated that the Assyrians made their influence felt, not
only in politics, but also in religion. It was the old
Babylonian worship of the luminaries of heaven which was
introduced into Judah in the eighth century, and which, after
receiving a short check during the reign of Hezekiah, became
very widely prevalent under his son. … There are many tokens
in the literature of the seventh century that the idolatrous
reaction of Manasseh penetrated deep, making many converts.
… Manasseh would apparently brook no opposition to the
idolatrous proclivities of his court; he met the indignation
of Isaiah's disciples and of the prophetical party by open and
relentless persecution. … The older historian of the Book of
Kings speaks of 'Manasseh shedding innocent blood very much,
till he had filled Jerusalem from one end to another.' This
innocent blood must have mainly flowed from those who opposed
his idolatrous tendencies. … From the accession of Manasseh
to the death of Amon (686-638), a period of forty-eight years,
this internal conflict continued; and in it, as always, the
blood of martyrs was the seed of the Church. In 638, Amon was
succeeded by his son Josiah; then only eight years old.
{1907}
It is possible that his accession brought about some
amelioration in the condition of the prophetical party, and
that active persecution ceased. But the syncretistic and
idolatrous worship was still maintained for another eighteen
years, though those years are passed over without any notice
in the Book of Kings. They were, however, years of great
importance in the history of Asia, for they witnessed the
break-up of the Assyrian empire, and the inroads of the
Scythians. The collapse of Assyria followed hard upon the
death of Asurbanipal in 626: Babylon revolted, the northern
and north-western provinces of the empire fell into the hands
of the Medes, and the authority of Assyria over the vassal
kingdoms of the west was gradually weakened."
_C. G. Montefiore,
Lectures on the Origin and Growth of Religion,
as illustrated by the Religion of the ancient Hebrews,
(Hibbert Lectures, 1892), lecture 4._
"The Assyrian empire was much weakened and the king could not
think of maintaining his power in the more distant provinces.
… In the year 610 B. C., Nineveh was again besieged, this
time by the Medes and Babylonians in league together. In the
same year Psammetichus, king of Egypt, died and was succeeded
by his son Necho. If Psammetichus had already tried to enlarge
his kingdom at the expense of Assyria, Necho was not the man
to miss the golden opportunity that now presented itself: he
proposed to seize Syria and Palestine, the Assyrian provinces
that bordered on his own kingdom, and thus to obtain his share
of the spoil, even if he did not help to bring down the giant.
By the second year after his accession to the throne he was on
the march to Syria with a large army. Probably it was
transported by sea and landed at Acco, on the Mediterranean,
whence it was to proceed overland. But in carrying out this
plan he encountered an unexpected obstacle: Josiah went to
meet him with an army and attempted to prevent his march to
Syria. … Josiah must have firmly believed that Jahveh would
fight for his people and defeat the Egyptian ruler. From what
Jeremiah tells us of the attitude of the prophets in the
reigns of Jehoiakim and Zedekiah, we must infer that many of
them strengthened the king in his intention not to endure an
encroachment such as that of the Pharaoh. The Chronicler
relates that Necho himself endeavored to dissuade Josiah from
the unequal contest. But [uselessly]. … The decisive battle
was fought in the valley of Megiddo: Judah was defeated;
Josiah perished. … After the victory in the valley of
Megiddo and the death of Josiah, Necho was master of the
kingdom of Judah. Before he arrived there, 'the people of the
land' made Jehoahaz, a younger son of Josiah, king, presumably
because he was more attached than his elder brother to his
father's policy. At all events, Necho hastened to depose him
and send him to Egypt. He was superseded by Eliakim,
henceforward called Jehoiakim. At first Jehoiakim was a vassal
of Egypt, and it does not appear that he made any attempt to
escape from this servitude. But it was not long before events
occurred elsewhere in Asia that entirely changed his position.
Nineveh had fallen; the Medes and the Chaldeans or Babylonians
now ruled over the former territory of the Assyrians; Syria
and Palestine fell to the share of the Babylonians. Of course,
the Egyptians were not inclined to let them have undisputed
possession. A battle was fought at Carchemish (Circesium), on
the Euphrates, between the armies of Necho and Nebuchadnezzar,
who then commanded in the name of his father, Nabopolassar,
but very shortly afterwards succeeded him. The Egyptians
sustained a crushing defeat (604 B. C). This decided the fate
of Western Asia, including Judæa."
_A. Kuenen,
The Religion of Israel,
chapter 6 (volume 2)._
JEWS: B. C. 604-536.
Fall of the kingdom of Judah.
The Babylonian captivity.
"In the fourth year of Jehoiakim (B. C. 604) the mightiest
monarch who had wielded the Assyrian power, Nebuchadnezzar,
was associated in the empire with his father, and assumed the
command of the armies of Assyria. Babylon now takes the place
of Nineveh as the capital of the Assyrian empire. …
Vassalage to the dominion of Egypt or of Babylon is now the
ignominious doom of the king of Judah. … Nebuchadnezzar,
having retaken Carchemish (B. C. 601), passed the Euphrates,
and rapidly overran the whole of Syria and Palestine.
Jerusalem made little resistance. The king was put in chains
to be carried as a prisoner to Babylon. On his submission, he
was reinstated on the throne; but the Temple was plundered of
many of its treasures, and a number of well-born youths, among
whom were Daniel, and three others, best known by their
Persian names, Shadrach, Meshech, and Abednego. From this date
commence the seventy years of the Captivity. Jehoiakim had
learned neither wisdom nor moderation from his misfortunes.
Three years after, he attempted to throw off the yoke of
Chaldea. … At length this weak and cruel king was slain (B.
C. 598). … Jehoiachin (Jeconias or Coniah), his son, had
scarcely mounted the throne, when Nebuchadnezzar himself
appeared at the gates of Jerusalem. The city surrendered at
discretion. The king and all the royal family, the remaining
treasures of the Temple, the strength of the army and the
nobility, and all the more useful artisans, were carried away
to Babylon. Over this wreck of a kingdom, Zedekiah
(Mattaniah), the younger son of Josiah, was permitted to enjoy
an inglorious and precarious sovereignty of eleven years,
during which he abused his powers, even worse than his
imbecile predecessors. In his ninth year, notwithstanding the
remonstrances of the wise Jeremiah, he endeavoured to assert
his independence; and Jerusalem, though besieged by
Nebuchadnezzar in person, now made some resistance. … At
length, in the city, famine reduced the fatal obstinacy of
despair. Jerusalem opened its gates to the irresistible
conqueror. The king, in an attempt to break through the
besieging forces, or meditating flight towards his ally, the
king of Ammon, was seized on the plain of Jericho. His
children were slain before his face, his eyes put out, and
thus the last king of the royal house of David, blind and
childless, was led away into a foreign prison. The capture of
Jerusalem took place on the ninth day of the fourth month: on
the seventh day of the fifth month (two days on which Hebrew
devotion still commemorates the desolation of the city by
solemn fast and humiliation) the relentless Nebuzaradan
executed the orders of his master by levelling the city, the
palaces, and the Temple, in one common ruin. The few remaining
treasures, particularly the two brazen pillars which stood
before the Temple, were sent to Babylon; the chief priests
were put to death, the rest carried into captivity. …
{1908}
The miserable remnant of the people were placed under the
command of Gedaliah, as a pasha of the great Assyrian monarch;
the seat of government was fixed at Mizpeh. … Nebuzaradan
(the general of Nebuchadnezzar) only left, according to the
strong language of the Second Book of Kings, xxv. 12, 'of the
poor of the land, to be vine-dressers and husbandmen.' … In
general it seems that the Jewish exiles [in Babylonia] were
allowed to dwell together in considerable bodies, not sold as
household or personal or prædial slaves, at least not those of
the better order of whom the Captivity chiefly consisted. They
were colonists rather than captives, and became by degrees
possessed of considerable property. … They had free
enjoyment of their religion, such at least as adhered
faithfully to their belief in Jehovah. We hear of no special
and general religious persecution. The first deportation of
chosen beautiful youths, after the earlier defeat of
Jehoiakim, for hostages, or as a kind of court-pages, was not
numerous. The second transportation swept away the king, his
wife, all the officers and attendants of his court, 7,000 of
the best of the army, 1,000 picked artisans, armourers, and
others, amounting to 10,023 men. The last was more general: it
comprehended the mass of the people, according to some
calculations towards 300,000 or 400,000 souls."
_H. H. Milman,
History of the Jews,
books 8-9, with foot-note (volume 1)._
The inhabitants left behind in Judæa "formed but a pitiful
remnant of the former kingdom of Judah. Part of them had grown
wild and led the lives of freebooters. Others busied
themselves with agriculture, but they had much to suffer from
the bands of Chaldean soldiers that roved about the land, and
from the neighbouring tribes, who took advantage of Israel's
abasement to extend their territories. … We do not know with
certainty the number of the exiles carried off by
Nebuchadnezzar: the returns given in the Old Testament are
evidently incomplete. But that their number was very
considerable, can be gathered from the number of those who
afterwards went back. For their intrinsic worth, even more
than for their numerical strength, these exiles had a right to
be regarded as the real representatives of the kingdom of
Judah and thus of all Israel. … It was … the kernel of the
nation that was brought to Babylonia. Our information as to
the social condition of the exiles is very defective. Even to
the question, where they had to settle, we can only return an
imperfect answer. We meet with a colony of exiles, companions
of Jeconiah, at Tel-abib, in the neighbourhood of the river
Chebar, usually supposed to be the Chaboras, which runs into
the Euphrates not far from Circesium, but considered by others
to be a smaller river, nearer to Babylon. It lay in the nature
of the case, that the second and third company of captives
received another destination. Even had it been possible,
prudence would have opposed their settling in the immediate
vicinity of their predecessors. We are not surprised therefore
that Ezekiel, who lived at Tel-abib, does not mention their
arrival there. Where they did go we are not told. The
historian says 'to Babylon,' to which place, according to him,
the first exiles (597 B. C.) were also brought; probably he
does not, in either passage, mean only the capital of the
Chaldean kingdom, but rather the province of that name to
which the city of course belonged. … Nebuchadnezzar's
purpose, the prevention of fresh disturbances, having been
attained by their removal from Judæa, he could now leave them
to develop their resources. It was even for the interest of
the districts in which they settled, that their development
should not be obstructed. Many unnecessary and troublesome
conflicts were avoided and the best provision was made for the
maintenance of order, by leaving them free, within certain
limits, to regulate their own affairs. So the elders of the
families and tribes remained in possession of the authority
which they had formerly exercised."
_A. Kuenen,
The Religion of Israel,
chapter 7 (volume 2)._
"About the middle of the sixth century before Christ, Cyrus,
King of Elam, began the career of conquest which left him
master of Western Asia. Greek writers of history have done
full justice to the character of this extraordinary man, but
what they tell of his origin, his early adventures and rise to
power, is for the most part mere fable. … Within recent
years a new light has been thrown on one of the dimmest
figures of the old world by the discovery of contemporary
documents, in which the Conqueror of Babylon himself records
his victories and the policy of his reign. … It appears from
the Inscriptions that the founder of the Persian Empire was by
no means the parvenu prince described by Herodotus. Cyrus was
a king's son, and in early youth, by legitimate succession,
himself became a king. From Susa (Shushan) on the Choaspes,
his capital city, he ruled over the fertile and populous
region lying eastward of the Lower Tigris which bore the name
of Elam or Susiana. This realm was one of the most ancient in
Western Asia. … Nabonidus became king of Babylon in the year
555 B. C. He had raised himself to the throne by conspiracy
and murder, and his position at first was insecure. The
eastern provinces, Syria and Phœnicia, rose in revolt against
the usurper, while the Medes on the north began a harassing
warfare and threatened an invasion of Babylonia. This latter
danger was averted for the time by an unlooked-for
deliverance. In the sixth year of Nabonidus (550 B. C.) Cyrus
led his army against Astyages, the Median king. The
discontented soldiery of Astyages mutinied on the eve of
battle, seized the person of their sovereign, and delivered
him up to the enemy. … This bloodless victory added Media to
the dominions of Cyrus, gave him Ecbatana as a second capital
and place of arms, and more than doubled his military
strength. … The real aim of Cyrus was the overthrow of
Babylon, and the construction of a new and still wider empire
on the ruins of the old. … Within the two years following
his conquest of the Medes he had extended his sway over the
kindred race of the Persians, from which he himself had
sprung. The wild tribes of Iran had long looked greedily on
the rich Chaldæan plains and cities, and only waited a leader
before swooping down like ravenous birds on their prey. This
leader appeared in Cyrus. … Forty years had passed since the
destruction of Jerusalem and the deportation of the great mass
of the Jewish people to Babylonia (588 B. C.). During this
period, under Nebuchadnezzar and his immediate successors on
the throne, the exiles had lived in peace, following without
interference their own customs, religious and social. …
Nothing hindered them from leading a quiet and comfortable
life among the Chaldæans, if only they were content to break
with their past and give up hope for the future.
{1909}
But this was impossible for all true Israelites. They could
not forget what they had been, or reconcile themselves to be
what they now were. They had the means of livelihood in
abundance, but to them their drink was as vinegar, their meat
as gall. … The home-sickness of the people finds manifold
expression in the literature of the Exile. … Now, as at
every crisis in the national history, the Prophets stood
forth, the true leaders of Israel. They kept the people
constantly in mind of their high destinies, and comforted and
encouraged them in their darkest hours. … Among the Jewish
exiles, enlightened by the prophetic word, the name Koresh
passed from lip to lip, and the movements of this new
Conqueror were followed with straining eyes. … In the month
Nisan (March) of the year 547 B. C., the ninth year of
Nabonidus, Cyrus crossed the Tigris at the fords of Arbela,
eastward of the modern Mosul, and began his first invasion of
Babylonia. … Meanwhile the fainéant king Nabonidus lingered
in his palace near Babylon, leaving the defence of the empire
to his eldest son, the Prince Royal Belshazzar. Whether
worsted in battle or, as is more likely, baffled by the
difficulties in the way of an invader—the country seamed
with water-courses, the numerous fortified towns, the Median
Wall—Cyrus was forced to retreat. … In the seventeenth
year of Nabonidus (539 B. C.) the King of Elam once more took
the field against Babylon. This time the attack was made from
the southeast. An opportune revolt of the southern provinces,
probably fomented by Cyrus himself, opened the way for him
into the heart of the land. … On all sides the disaffected
subjects of Nabonidus went over to the invader, who passed on
at the head of his 'vast army, innumerable, like the waters of
a river,' without meeting any serious resistance. The last
hope of Nabonidus rested on his Army of the North. In the
month Tammuz (June) a pitched battle was fought near Routou, a
town in Accad, and ended in the defeat of the Babylonians. A
revolution followed at once. … Some days later the
victorious army, under a lieutenant of the King, appeared
before the walls of Babylon. The collapse of all authority
made useless defences which were the wonder of the world;
friendly hands threw open the brazen gates, and without a
struggle the great city fell. … Four months later Cyrus
entered Babylon in triumph. … The hitherto accepted opinion
that Cyrus was an Aryan monotheist, a worshipper of Ormazd,
and therefore so far in religious sympathy with the Jews, is
seriously shaken if not overthrown by the Inscriptions which
record his Babylonian conquest. Even if allowance be made for
the fact that these are state documents, and reveal only what
the monarch professed, not necessarily what he believed, there
still remains the strong probability that Cyrus was not
Zoroastrian in creed, but polytheist like his people of Elam.
The Cyrus of the Inscriptions is either a fanatical idolater
or simply an opportunist in matters of religion. The latter
alternative is the more probable."
_P. H. Hunter,
After the Exile,
part 1, chapters 1-2._
JEWS: B. C. 537.
The return from Babylon.
"The fall of the metropolis had decided the fortune of the
Babylonian kingdom, and the provinces. The most important of
these was Syria, with the great trading places of the
Phenicians on the Mediterranean. … The hopes of the Jews
were at last fulfilled. The fall of Babylon had avenged the
fall of Jerusalem, and the subjugation of Syria to the armies
of Babylon opened the way for their return. Cyrus did not
belie the confidence which the Jews had so eagerly offered
him; without hesitation he gave the exiles permission to
return and erect again their shrine at Jerusalem. The return
of the captives and the foundation of a new state of the Jews
was very much to his interest; it might contribute to support
his empire in Syria. He did not merely count on the gratitude
of the returning exiles, but as any revival of the Babylonian
kingdom, or rebellion of the Syrians against the Persian
empire, imperilled the existence of this community, which had
not only to be established anew, but would never be very
strong, it must necessarily oppose any such attempts.
Forty-nine years—seven Sabbatical years, instead of the ten
announced by Jeremiah—had passed since the destruction of
Jerusalem, and more than sixty since Jeremiah had first
announced the seventy years of servitude to Babylon. Cyrus
commissioned Zerubbabel, the son of Salathiel, a grandson of
Jechoniah, the king who had been carried away captive, and
therefore a scion of the ancient royal race, and a descendant
of David, to be the leader of the returning exiles, to
establish them in their abode, and be the head of the
community; he bade his treasurer Mithridates give out to him
the sacred vessels, which Nebuchadnezzar had carried away as
trophies to Babylon, and placed in the temple of Bel; there
are said to have been more than 5,000 utensils of gold and
silver, baskets, goblets, cups, knives, etc. But all the Jews
in Babylon did not avail themselves of the permission. Like
the Israelites deported by Sargon into Media and Assyria some
180 years previously, many of the Jews brought to Mesopotamia
and Babylonia at the time of Jechoniah and Zedekiah, had found
there a new home, which they preferred to the land of their
fathers. But the priests (to the number of more than 3,000),
many of the families of the heads of the tribes, all who cared
for the sanctuary and the old country, all in whom Jehovah
'awoke the spirit,' as the Book of Ezra says, began the march
over the Euphrates. With Zerubbabel was Joshua, the high
priest, the most distinguished among all the Jews, a grandson
of the high priest, Zeraiah, whom Nebuchadnezzar had executed
after the capture of Jerusalem. … It was a considerable
multitude which left the land 'beyond the stream,' the waters
of Babylon, to sit once more under the fig-tree in their
ancient home, and build up the city of David and the temple of
Jehovah from their ruins; 42,360 freemen, with 7,337 Hebrew
men-servants and maid-servants; their goods were carried by
435 camels, 736 horses, 250 mules, and 6,720 asses (537 B.
C.). The exodus of the Jews from Babylon is accompanied by a
prophet with cries of joy, and announcements filled with the
wildest hopes. … 'Go forth from Babylon,' he cries; 'fly
from the land of the Chaldæans! Proclaim it with shouts of
joy, tell it to the end of the earth and say: "Jehovah hath
redeemed his servant Jacob."'
{1910}
'How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that
bringeth glad tidings, that publisheth peace, that saith unto
Zion, Thy God reigneth. Up, up, go forth, touch no unclean
person; go forth from among them. Cleanse yourselves, ye that
bear Jehovah's vessels. Ye shall go forth in joy, and be led
in peace; the mountains and the hills shall break forth before
you into singing, and all the trees shall clap their hands.
Jehovah goes before you, and the God of Israel brings up the
rear. … Jehovah calls thee as an outcast sorrowful woman,
and thy God speaks to thee as to a bride who has been put
away; thy ruins, and deserts, and wasted land, which was
destroyed from generation to generation—thy people build up
the ruins, and renew the ancient cities. Behold, I will make
thy desert like Eden, and thy wilderness like the garden of
the Lord; I will lay thy stones with bright lead, and thy
foundations with sapphires, and make thy towers of rubies and
thy gates of carbuncles. Joy and delight is in them,
thanksgiving and the sound of strings. The wealth of the sea
shall come to thee, and the treasures of the nations shall be
thine; like a stream will I bring salvation upon Israel, and
the treasures of the nations like an overflowing river. Thy
sons hasten onward; those that laid thee waste go forth from
thee. Lift up thine eyes and see; thy sons come from far, and
I will gather them to those that are gathered together. The
islands and the ships of Tarshish wait to bring thy children
from afar, their gold and their silver with them. The land
will be too narrow for the inhabitants; widen the place for
thy tent, let the carpets of thy habitation be spread—delay
not. Draw out the rope; to the right and to the left must thou
be widened. I will set up my banner for the nations, that they
bring thy sons in their arm, and thy daughters shall be
carried on the shoulders. Kings shall be thy guardians, and
queens thy nursing-mothers; I will bow them to the earth
before thee, and they shall lick the dust of thy feet, and
thou shalt know that I am Jehovah, and they who wait patiently
for me shall not be put to shame.' Such expectations and hopes
were far from being realised. The Edomites had, in the
mean-time, extended their borders and obtained possession of
the South of Judah, but the land immediately round Jerusalem
was free and no doubt almost depopulated. As the returning
exiles contented themselves with the settlement at Jerusalem,
the towns to the North, Anathoth, Gebah, Michmash,
Kirjath-Jearim, and some others—only Bethlehem is mentioned
to the South—they found nothing to impede them. Their first
care was the restoration of the worship, according to the law
and the custom of their fathers. … Then voluntary gifts were
collected from all for the rebuilding of the temple;
contributions even came in from those who had remained in
Babylonia, so that 70,000 pieces of gold and 5,000 mimæ of
silver are said to have been amassed. Tyrian masons were
hired, and agreements made with Tyrian carpenters, to fell
cedars in Lebanon, and bring them to Joppa, for which Cyrus
had given his permission. The foundation of the temple was
laid in the second year of the return (536 B. C.). … The
fortunate beginning of the restoration of the city and temple
soon met with difficulties. The people of Samaria, who were a
mixture of the remnant of the Israelites and the strangers
whom Sargon had brought there after the capture of Samaria,
… and Esarhaddon at a later date, … came to meet the
exiles in a friendly spirit, and offered them assistance, from
which we must conclude that in spite of the foreign admixture
the Israelitish blood and the worship of Jehovah were
preponderant in Samaria. The new temple would thus have been
the common sanctuary of the united people of Israel. But the
'sons of captivity' were too proud of the sorrows which they
had undergone, and the fidelity which they had preserved to
Jehovah, and their pure descent, to accept this offer. Hence
the old quarrel between Israel and Judah broke out anew, and
the exiles soon felt the result. After their repulse the
Samaritans set themselves to hinder the building by force;
'they terrified the exiles that they built no more, and hired
counsellors to make the attempt vain during the
whole of the remainder of the reign of Cyrus.'"
_M. Duncker,
History of Antiquity,
book 8, chapter 8 (volume 6)._
The duration of the Captivity, strictly speaking, "was only
forty-seven years, if we reckon by the Canon of Ptolemy, from
the 19th year of Nabuchodrozzor to the first of Cyrus; or,
better, forty-nine years, if we add on, as we probably ought
to do, the two years' reign of the Median king whom Cyrus set
on the throne of Babylon."
_H. Ewald,
History of Israel,
book 5, introduction._
"The decree of Cyrus, at the close of the captivity, extended
only to the rebuilding of the Temple. 'Thus saith Cyrus, king
of Persia, The Lord God of heaven … hath charged me to build
him an house at Jerusalem.' And under this decree Jeshua and
Zerubbabel 'builded the altar of the God of Israel. … But
the foundation of the Temple of the Lord was not yet laid.'
Afterwards they 'laid the foundation of the Temple of the
Lord,' including, apparently, the outer wall, for their
enemies made a representation to the king of Persia that the
Jews were rebuilding the walls of their city: 'The Jews which
came up from thee to us are … building the rebellious and
the bad city, and have set up the walls thereof, and joined
the foundations.' And as the wall of the Temple, which was
about twelve feet thick, gave a colour to the charge, a decree
was issued by Artaxerxes to prohibit the further prosecution
of the work. 'Then ceased the work of the house of God, which
is at Jerusalem.' On the accession of Darius to the throne of
Persia, Jeshua and Zerubbabel recommenced the restoration of
the Temple, including the wall of the Outer Temple, for they
'began to build the house of God,' when their enemies again
stepped forward, saying, 'Who hath commanded you to build this
house, and to make up this wall?' And on a renewed complaint
to the king of Persia, search was made for the decree of
Cyrus, and when it was found, Darius permitted the Jews to
proceed with the Temple; 'Let the governor of the Jews and the
'elders of the Jews build this house of God in his place;' and
thereupon the structure and the outer walls thereof (the
square of 600 feet) were completed: 'They builded and finished
it … on the third day of the month Adar, which was in the
sixth year of the reign of Darius the king.' Thus far the
rebuilding extended to the Temple only, and not to the walls
of the city. Ezra afterwards obtained a decree to restore the
nationality of the Jews, viz., to 'set magistrates and judges,
which might judge all the people;' and afterwards Nehemiah,
the cupbearer to the king, was enabled in a favourable moment
to win from him express permission to rebuild the Baris, or
Vestry, afterwards Antonia, and also the city: 'Send me unto
Judah, unto the city of my fathers' sepulchres, that I may
build it;' and a direction was given to the governors beyond
the Euphrates to forward Nehemiah and his company to
Jerusalem; and the king's forester was required to supply the
necessary timber."
_T. Lewin,
Jerusalem,
chapter 2._
{1911}
"The Jews returned home sobered and improved by their
sufferings in exile, and entirely cured of their early
hankering after idolatry. Having no political independence,
and living under a governor, they devoted themselves all the
more to religion, the only source and support of their
nationality, and became zealots for the law, and for a devout
carrying out of all its precepts, as far as practicable. All,
indeed, could not be again restored, The most holy of the new
temple was empty, for it was without the lost and
irreplaceable ark of the covenant; the oracular ornaments of
the high-priest had disappeared. As Jerusalem was now, far
more than formerly, the head and heart of the nation, the
high-priesthood … was the authority to which the nation
willingly submitted; it served as the representative and
pillar of unity, and the sons of David were forgotten. Another
of the abiding consequences of their exile was, the altered
mode of life which the nation led. At first they had been
exclusively devoted to agriculture; but after mixing with
strangers they learnt to engage in trade, and this inclination
went on always increasing; it contributed essentially to their
being spread far beyond the borders of Palestine, and to their
multiplying their settlements in foreign lands."
_J. J. I. Dollinger,
The Gentile and the Jew
in the Courts of the Temple of Christ,
book 10, section 1 (volume 2)._
ALSO IN:
_H. H. Milman,
History of the Jews,
book 9._
JEWS: B. C. 536-A. D. 50.
The Babylonian Jews.
"There is something very remarkable in the history of this
race, for the most part descendants of those families which
had refused to listen to the summons of Zorobabel, Ezra, and
Nehemiah, and to return to the possession of their native
country. … The singular part of their history is this, that,
though willing aliens from their native Palestine, they
remained Jews in character and religion; they continued to be
a separate people, and refused to mingle themselves with the
population of the country in which they were domiciliated.
While those who returned to the Holy Land were in danger of
forming a mixed race, by intermarriages with the neighbouring
tribes, which it required all the sternest exercise of
authority in their rulers to prevent, the Babylonian Jews were
still as distinct a people as the whole race of Israel has
been since the final dispersion. … Nor did they, like the
Jews of Alexandria, become in any degree independent of the
great place of national worship; they were as rigid Jews as if
they had grown up within sight of the Temple. … The Temple
became what the Caaba of Mecca is to the Mohammedans, the
object of the profoundest reverence, and sometimes of a pious
pilgrimage; but the land of their fathers had lost its hold on
their affections; they had no desire to exchange the level
plains of Babylonia for the rich pastures, the golden
cornfields, or the rocky vineyards of Galilee and Judæa. This
Babylonian settlement was so numerous and flourishing, that
Philo more than once intimates the possibility of their
marching in such force to the assistance of their brethren in
Palestine, in case the Roman oppression was carried to excess,
as to make the fate of the war very doubtful. Their chief city
Nearda, was strongly situated in a bend of the river
Euphrates, which almost surrounded the town." About the middle
of the first century (of the Christian era) a band of
freebooters, formed by two brothers of this Jewish community,
gave great provocation to the Babylonians, and to the Parthian
king whose subjects they then were. They were finally, but
with much difficulty, destroyed, and the Babylonians then
"began to commit dreadful reprisals on the whole Jewish
population. The Jews, unable to resist, fled in great numbers
to Seleucia; six years after many more took refuge from a
pestilence in the same city. Seleucia happened to be divided
into two factions: one of the Greeks, the other of the
Syrians. The Jews threw themselves into the scale of the
Syrians, who thus obtained a superiority, till the Greeks came
to terms with the Syrians; and both parties agreed to fall
upon the unhappy Jews. As many as 50,000 men were slain. The
few who escaped fled to Ctesiphon. Even there the enmity of
the Seleucians pursued them; and at length the survivors took
refuge in their old quarters, Nearda and Nisibis."
_H. H. Milman,
History of the Jews,
book 12 (volume 2)._
JEWS: B. C. 433-332.
The century of Silence.
"The interval between the Testaments has been called 'The
Centuries of Silence.' The phrase is most untrue; for, as a
whole, this time was vocal with the cry of a battle in which
empire contended with empire, and philosophy with philosophy:
it was an age of earnest and angry contention. But the hundred
years succeeding the death of Nehemiah are for us, so far as
any record remains of that Judæan history, a century of
silence. For some reason which does not appear, the period
from the death of this sturdy old captain at Jerusalem to the
time of the Greek conquest of Persia has no Jewish history.
That it was a period of growth and development with the
Judæans—especially in their theological and ecclesiastical
life—is evident from the changes which the close of the
century shows. The stress of external events made it a time of
heavy taxation and distress,—a time of struggle with Samaria,
and of internal conflict for the control of the high priest's
office."
_T. R Slicer,
Between the Testaments
(The New World, March, 1892)._
JEWS: B. C. 413-332.
The rule of the High Priests.
"After the death of Nehemiah and the high priest, Eliashib
(413 B. C.), the Persian Court did not appoint governors of
Judea. Samaria was the seat of the Persian Satrap for Syria,
Phœnicia and Palestine. The sons of David had lost prestige
under Nehemiah (Psalm lxxxix.). The ruler acknowledged by the
Law, the prophet (Deuteronomy xviii. 15), was no more; the
last prophets under Nehemiah, with the exception of Malachi,
had proved unworthy of their illustrious predecessors.
Therefore, the high priest was now the first man in the
theocracy, and, contrary to the Laws of Moses (Leviticus x.
3), he was acknowledged the chief ruler of the nation,
although he was no longer the bearer of the Urim and Thumim
(Ezra ii. 63). He presided over the Great Synod, was the
representative of the people before the king and his satrap,
and gradually he established himself in the highest dignity of
the nation."
_I. M. Wise,
History of the Hebrews' Second Commonwealth, 1st period,
chapter 4._
{1912}
JEWS: B. C. 332-167.
The Greek domination.
Jewish dispersion.
Hellenism.
On the fall of the Persian monarchy, Judea, with all the rest
of western Asia, was gathered into the empire of Alexander the
Great (see MACEDONIA: B. C. 334-330, and after), Jerusalem
submitting to him without a siege, and so avoiding the fate of
Tyre. In the wars between Alexander's generals and successors,
which followed his death, Palestine changed masters several
times, but does not seem to have been much disturbed. The High
Priests continued to be the chiefs of the nation, and neither
the religion nor the internal government of the Hebrew state
suffered much interference. The final partition made among the
new Macedonian kings (B. C. 302), gave Palestine to Ptolemy of
Egypt, and it remained subject to Egypt for a century. This
period was a happy one, on the whole, for the Jews. The
Ptolemies were friendly to them, with one exception,
respecting their religion and laws. Large numbers of them
settled in Egypt, and especially in the rising new capital and
emporium of trade—Alexandria. But in 201 B. C. Antiochus the
Great, king of the Syrian or Seleucid monarchy, wrested
Cœlosyria and Palestine from the Ptolemies and added it to his
own dominions.
See SELEUCIDÆ: B. C. 224-187.
Antiochus dealt favorably with the Jews, but his successors
proved harder masters than the Egyptian Greeks.
_H. Ewald,
History of Israel,
book 5, section 2 (volume 5)._
"These kings promoted the settlement of Greeks and Syrians in
Palestine, so that it was by degrees all covered with cities
and towns of Grecian nomenclature. The narrow territory of
Judea alone kept free of them, but was surrounded with
settlers whose speech, customs, and creed were Greek. On the
other hand, the Jews went on spreading in lands where Greek
was spoken. A good many of these were planted in Egypt, in the
newly founded capital Antioch, in Lydia and Phrygia. Led on by
their love of trade, they soon became numerous in the
commercial cities of western Asia, Ephesus, Pergamus, Miletus,
Sardis, &c. From Egypt and Alexandria, in which city, at a
later period, they formed two-fifths of the inhabitants, they
drew along the coast of Africa to Cyrene and the towns of the
Pentapolis, and from Asia Anterior to the Macedonian and Greek
marts; for the national love of commerce became more and more
developed, till it absorbed all other occupations, and to this
certainly the general inclination for commercial intercourse,
prevalent at that period, greatly contributed. Thus it
happened that two movements, identical in their operation,
crossed each other, viz., an influx of Greek, or of Asiatic
but hellenised, settlers into Palestine, and an outpouring of
Jews and Samaritans into the, cities speaking the Greek
tongue. In olden times, while the Israelites still possessed a
national kingdom, they felt their isolation from other people
as a burden. It was as an oppressive yoke to them, which they
bore impatiently, and were always trying to shake off. They
wanted to live like other nations, to eat, drink, and
intermarry with them, and, together with their own God, to
honour the gods of the stranger also; for many raw and
carnally-minded Jews only looked upon the one special God and
protector of their nation as one god amongst many. But now
there was a complete change in this respect. The Jews
everywhere lived and acted upon the fundamental principle,
that between them and all other nations there was an
insurmountable barrier; they shut themselves off, and formed
in every town separate corporations, with officers of their
own; while at the same time they kept up a constant connexion
with the sanctuary at Jerusalem. They paid a tribute to the
temple there, which was carefully collected everywhere, and
from time to time conveyed in solemn procession to Jerusalem.
There alone, too, could the sacrifices and gifts which were
demanded by the law be offered. In this wise they preserved a
centre and a metropolis. And yet there followed from all this
an event, which in its consequences was one of the most
important in history, namely, the hellenising of the Jews who
were living out of Judea, and even, in a degree, of those who
remained in their own land. They were a people too gifted
intellectually to resist the magnetic power by which the
Hellenistic tongue and modes of thought and action worked even
upon such as were disposed to resist them on principle. The
Jews in the commercial towns readily acquired the Greek, and
soon forgot their mother tongue; and as the younger generation
already in their domestic circle were not taught Greek by
natives, as might be supposed, this Jewish Greek grew into a
peculiar idiom, the Hellenistic. During the reign of the
second Ptolemy, 284-247 B. C., the law of Moses was translated
at Alexandria into Greek, probably more to meet the religious
wants of the Jews of the dispersion than to gratify the desire
of the king. The necessity of a knowledge of Hebrew for the
use of the holy Scriptures was thereby done away with, and
Greek language and customs became more and more prevalent.
Individuals began to join this or that school of philosophy,
according to predilection and intellectual bias. The Platonic
philosophy had necessarily most attractions for the disciples
of Moses. The intrusion of Hellenism into Judea itself met
with a much more considerable resistance from the old
believing and conservative Jews. Those of the heathen
dispersion were obliged to be satisfied with mere prayer,
Bible readings and expositions, in their proseuchæ and
synagogues, and to do without the solemn worship and
sacrifices of the temple; but in Jerusalem the temple-worship
was carried out with all its ancient usages and symbols. There
presided the Sopherim, the Scribes or skilled expounders of
the law, a title first appropriated to Esdras (about 450 B.
C.). He was one of the founders of the new arrangements in the
restored state, and was a priest, and at the same time a judge
appointed by the king of Persia. … From that time forth
dependence on the law, pride in its possession as the pledge
of divine election, and the careful custody of this wall of
partition, sank deep into the character of the nation, and
became the source of many advantages as well as of serious
faults. … The later Jewish tradition makes much mention of
the great synagogue believed to have existed already in the
time of Esdras, or to have been founded by him. It is supposed
to have mustered 120 members, and, under the presidency of the
high-priest, was to be the guardian of the law and doctrine.
{1913}
One of its last rulers was Simon the Just, who was
high-priest, and the most distinguished doctor of his time
(that of the first Ptolemys). Afterwards this threefold
dignity or function of high-priest, scribe or rabbi, and of
Nasi or prince of the synagogue, were never united in one
person. … The high-priesthood fell into contempt, the more
it served foreign rulers as the venal instrument of their
caprice; but the Scribes flourished as being the preservers of
all theological and juridical knowledge, and were supported by
the respect and confidence of the people. … By the year 170
B. C., Hellenism had undoubtedly made such progress among the
Jews, in Palestine even, that the Assyrian king, Antiochus
Epiphanes, was able to plan the extirpation of the Jewish
religion, and the conversion of the temple at Jerusalem into a
temple of Jupiter Olympius."
_J. J. I. Döllinger,
The Gentile and the Jew
in the Courts of the Temple of Christ,
book 10, section 1 (volume 2)._
Twice, Antiochus Epiphanes crushed rebellion in Jerusalem with
awful ferocity. On the last occasion, the slain were believed
to number 80,000, while 10,000 captives were led away and sold
as slaves. The city was sacked and partly burned; the Temple
was plundered and polluted. "Not content with these
enormities, Antiochus determined to abolish altogether the
Jewish religion, and, if possible, entirely to exterminate the
race. With this intention, he issued an edict throughout his
dominions, calling upon all the nations who were subject to
his authority to renounce their religion and worship his gods,
and this order he enforced with the most severe pains and
penalties. The Jews were the only people who ventured to
disobey the edict, whereupon, Antiochus ordered them to be
treated with the utmost rigour, and sent to Jerusalem an old
man named Atheneas, who was well versed in the rites of the
Greek worship, as commissioner, to enforce obedience to his
commands. This old pagan dedicated the Temple to Jupiter
Olympus, and placed a statue of that false deity upon the
altar of burnt offering. This desecration was not confined to
Jerusalem, for everywhere throughout the Syrian empire groves
and temples were dedicated, and statues and altars erected, to
the heathen deities, and the worship of the true God was
everywhere prohibited, and punished as the worst of crimes.
That the chief fury of Antiochus's impious rage was directed
against the Jews is evident from the fact that, whilst a
general edict was published, condemning to death or torture
all those who refused to worship the idols, a special decree
was promulgated, by which it was made death to offer
sacrifices to the God of Israel, observe the Sabbath, practise
circumcision, or indeed to conform in the smallest degree to
the precepts of the Mosaic law. Every effort was also made to
destroy the copies of the Holy Scriptures; and persons
refusing to deliver them up were punished by death. In this
terrible distress, many of the Jews abandoned their homes and
took shelter in the wilderness, where 'they lived in the
mountains after the manner of beasts, and fed on herbs
continuously lest they should be partakers of the pollution'
(Maccabees v.). Of those who remained behind, some few yielded
to the temptation, and saved themselves by apostacy, but the
majority remained faithful to the God of their forefathers,
Who, in His own good time, hearkened to the prayers of His
people, and sent them a deliverer."
_E. H. Palmer,
History of the Jewish Nation,
chapter 7._
JEWS: B. C. 166-40.
Revolt of the Maccabees.
Reign of the Asmoneans.
Rise of Herod.
The heroic family called The Maccabees, which began and led
the revolt of the Jewish people against the oppression and
persecution of the Seleucidæan kings, bore, also, the name of
the Asmonean or Hasmonean family, derived from the name of
"its chief of four generations back, Chasmon, or Asmon, 'the
magnate.'" The head of the family at the time of the outbreak
of the revolt, and who precipitated it, was Mattathias. He had
five sons, the third of whom, Judas, became the military
leader and great hero of the nation in its struggle. To Judas
was given the surname or appellation of Makkabi, from whence
came his historical name of Judas Maccabæus, and the general
name of The Maccabees by which his family at large is commonly
designated. The surname "Makkabi" is conjectured to have had
the same meaning as that of Charles the "Martel"—viz., the
"Hammerer"; but this is questioned. "Under Judas the revolt
assumed larger proportions, and in a short time he was able to
meet and defeat the Syrians in the open field. The situation
which the Romans had created in Syria was favourable to the
Jewish cause. In order to find money to pay the tribute
imposed by Rome upon his house; Antiochus had to undertake an
expedition into the Far East, which depleted Syria of a large
number of troops. During the king's absence the government of
the country was entrusted to a high functionary named Lysias.
Lysias took a serious view of the rebellion in Judæa, and
despatched a force under the command of three generals to
suppress it. But this army met with alarming reverses at the
hands of Judas, and Lysias was obliged to go to Palestine in
person to conduct the campaign. Meanwhile Antiochus had been
apprised of the disasters which had befallen his captains, and
was hastening homewards to assume the supreme direction of
affairs, when death put a termination to his career (B. C.
164). The pressure of Roman policy upon Antiochus was the
indirect cause of the Jewish revolt, and the immediate cause
of the king's inability to suppress it. After the death of
Antiochus, the distracted state of Syria and the struggles of
rival pretenders for the crown strengthened the position of
the Jewish patriots. Antiochus V., son of the late king, was
only nine years old when he began to reign (B. C. 164). His
father had appointed a courtier named Philip regent during his
son's minority. But this arrangement did not satisfy Lysias,
who had the young king in his custody, and who was carrying on
the campaign in Palestine when the news of his supersession by
Philip arrived. Lysias immediately left off the contest with
Judas, and devoted his energies to the task of resisting
Philip's claims. At this juncture, if any historic value can
be attached to a statement in the Second Book of the
Maccabees, two Roman envoys, Quintus Memmius and Titus
Manlius, who were probably on their way from Alexandria to
Antioch, offered to take charge of Jewish interests at the
Syrian capital. Peace is said to have been the outcome of
their efforts (B. C. 162). But it was a peace which did not
endure.
{1914}
In the following year the Syrian king once more invaded
Palestine at the head of a great army, and, in spite of the
strenuous opposition of Judas, laid siege to the Holy City.
Famine soon reduced the garrison to the last extremities, and
their fate would have been a hard one had not the disordered
condition of Syria compelled the besiegers to accept
honourable terms. Whilst the siege was in progress news came
to the Syrian camp that Philip had put himself at the head of
a large army, with the intention of enforcing his claims to
the regency. No time was to be lost, and the king, acting on
the advice of Lysias, accorded the Jews religious liberty.
Jerusalem capitulated; and the same order of things was
established as had existed previous to the insurrection. Soon
after these events Antiochus V. was dethroned and executed by
his relative, Demetrius I. In Judæa the new monarch allowed
the people to retain the religious liberties granted them by
his predecessor, and had he exercised more judgment in the
selection of a High Priest it would have been impossible for
Judas to renew the struggle against Syria with any prospect of
success. The Assidæans, or Pious Ones, who afterwards
developed into the party known as the Pharisees, and who,
while their religion was at stake, were devoted followers of
Judas, were satisfied with the attainment of religious
freedom. But Judas and his friends, who formed the party which
afterwards became the Sadducees, … were unwilling to relax
their efforts till the country was completely independent. The
Assidæans, consisting of the scribes and the bulk of the
population, accepted Alcimus, the High Priest whom Demetrius
had appointed, and were disposed for peace. But the senseless
barbarities of Alcimus threw the Assidæans once more into the
arms of the war party, and the struggle began afresh. The High
Priest was obliged to flee from Jerusalem; Demetrius sent an
army to reinstate him, but Judas defeated the Syrian forces,
and the Jews enjoyed a short period of repose. … Two Jewish
delegates, Eupolemos and Jason, were sent to Italy to form an
alliance with Rome. The Senate, which never neglected an
opportunity of crippling the Syrian monarchy, accorded a
favourable reception to the Jewish envoys, and acknowledged
the independence of their country. … While these
negotiations were taking place the Syrian army again invaded
Palestine. Judas went forth to meet them, and, after a
desperate conflict, was defeated and slain [at Beer-Zath] (B.
C. 161). The death of their leader shattered the party of
freedom, and the Romans, probably because they saw no distinct
centre of authority left standing in the country, ignored the
treaty they had just made with the Jewish envoys, and left
Judæa to its fate. It was not by direct intervention that the
Romans helped the Jews forward on the path of independence; it
was by the disintegrating action of Roman policy on the
kingdom of Syria. The Jewish leaders did not fail to take
advantage of the opportunities which were thus afforded them.
About nine years after the death of Judas Maccabæus, the
Romans started a new pretender to the Syrian crown in the
person of Alexander Balas, a young man of unknown origin (B.
C. 152). Supported by the allies of Rome, Balas was able to
take the field against Demetrius, who became alarmed at the
threatening aspect of affairs: Jonathan, a brother of Judas,
was then at the head of the Jewish patriots (B. C. 161-142),
and Demetrius attempted by concessions to win him over to his
side. When the pretender Balas heard of this, he immediately
outbade Demetrius, and offered Jonathan the High Priesthood as
the price of his support. Jonathan sold himself to the highest
bidder, and, notwithstanding further profuse promises from
Demetrius, the Jewish leader remained true to his allegiance.
The war between the two rivals did not last long; Demetrius
was overthrown and slain (B. C. 151), and at the marriage of
the new king, Jonathan was appointed civil and military
governor of Judæa." The spiritual and the temporal government
of the Jews was now united in the office of High Priest.
Jonathan, captured and murdered by one of the Syrian
pretenders, was succeeded in the office (B. C. 142), by
another brother, Simon, who was assassinated, B. C. 135, by an
ambitious son-in-law. Simon's son, John Hyrcanus, took his
place.
_W. D. Morrison,
The Jews under Roman Rule,
chapter 1._
The Asmonean family had now become so established in its
princely character that the next of the line, Judas (who took
the Greek name Aristobulus), assumed the crown and title of
King (B. C. 105). Aristobulus reigned less than two years, and
was succeeded by his brother Jonathan (Jannæus) Alexander.
"These Jewish princes were as wide apart in character as in
name from the house whose honours they inherited. Aristobulus,
the bloody, … starved in prison his mother, whom John had
left as regent. … Alexander, named Jannæus, in a reign of
five and twenty years, was mostly occupied in petty
wars,—generally unsuccessful, but indefatigable to begin
afresh. He signalized himself in successive revolts of his
people, first by the barbarous slaughter of 6,000, then by a
civil war of some six years, which cost 10,000 lives, and
finally by crucifying 800. … A restless, dissolute,
ambitious man, called 'the Thracian' for his barbarities, his
rule abhorred except for the comparative mercy he showed in
the cities he had conquered, he died [B. C. 79] before the age
of fifty, having done the one service of confirming the Jewish
power upon the soil of Palestine."
_J. H. Allen,
Hebrew Men and Times,
chapter 10._