_Capture of Jerusalem.—Shishak.—Shalmaneser II.—Inscription
describing the campaign of his sixth year.—Correction of the
Biblical chronology.—The worship of Rimmon.—War against
Hazael.—The black obelisk.—Rimmon-nirari.—Tiglath-Pileser II.—The
fall of Arpad.—Menahem pays tribute.—Alliance of Ahaz with
Assyria.—Capture of Samaria and of Damascus.—Destruction of
Samaria.—Sargon, Cuthah, and
Sepharvaim.—Merodach-baladan.—Invasion of Judah by Sargon.—True
interpretation of Isaiah x. and xi.—Sennacherib’s invasion.—His
account of it.—The Biblical account.—The date.—The Lachish
bas-relief.—Jewish policy in Hezekiah’s reign.—Hezekiah’s public
works.—The will of Sennacherib.—Esar-haddon’s reign.—Explanation
of 2 Chron. xxxiii. 2.—Isaiah xix.—Reign of Assur-bani-pal.—Date
of the fall of Assyria.—Chronological table of events described in
the chapter._
When David founded his empire his two powerful neighbours, Egypt and
Assyria, were both in a state of decline. Assyria had fallen into the
hands of unwarlike kings, who were unable to retain the conquests of their
predecessors, even upon their immediate frontiers; while Egypt was divided
among rival dynasties and rent with civil wars. Egypt, however, was the
first to recover her strength. The monarchs of the twenty-second dynasty
once more united the country under one rule, and Shishak or Sheshank I
turned his arms against the cities of Palestine. The brief account given
in 1 Kings xiv. 25, 26, and the fuller history in 2 Chron. xii. of his
invasion of Judah and his capture of Jerusalem, are supplemented by his
own record of it on the walls of the ruined temple of Karnak. Here the
Egyptian king is represented as striking down the conquered Hebrews with a
colossal club, while beside him run long rows of embattled shields, within
each of which is the name of a vanquished city. Among them we find the
names not only of Jewish towns but of Israelitish fortresses also—such as
Megiddo, Taanach, and Abel—a proof that the Egyptian campaign was directed
against the northern kingdom as well as against Judah, and could not,
therefore, have been undertaken at the instigation of Jeroboam, as has
sometimes been supposed. One of the cities is called Judah-melek, or
“Judah-king,” a title by which it is possible that Jerusalem may have been
intended. At any rate, there is otherwise no mention of the royal city of
Rehoboam among the shields that have been preserved.
The vigorous rule of Shishak had not ceased long before Egypt once more
sank into a state of anarchy and weakness, which ended in its conquest by
the Ethiopian Sabako, the So of the Old Testament (2 Kings xvii. 4).
Meanwhile Assyria had recovered its strength, and had entered upon a new
career of conquest. In B.C. 858 Shalmaneser II came to the throne, and his
long reign of thirty-five years was one continuous history of campaigns
against his neighbours, in the course of which the authority of Assyria
was extended as far as the Mediterranean. The growing power of Damascus,
which Rezon had torn from the empire of David in the time of Solomon (1
Kings xi. 23-25), formed the chief object of his attack. Already, in the
sixth year of his reign, he had overthrown the combined forces of
Damascus, of Hamath, and of the Hittites, and had slain 20,500 of his
enemies in battle. Damascus was at this time governed by Hadad-idri or
Hadadezer, the Ben-hadad II of Scripture, the Scriptural name being a
standing title of the Syrian kings, and signifying “the son of Hadad,” the
supreme deity of Damascus. Three years later Shalmaneser again attacked
the Syrian king; but it was not until his fourteenth year, when he crossed
the Euphrates with an army of 120,000 men, that he achieved any
substantial success.
The campaign of the sixth year is narrated in detail in an inscription
engraved by the Assyrian monarch on the rocks of Armenia. Here we learn
that, after crossing the Euphrates, he received the tribute of the Hittite
states in Pethor, the city of Balaam, which he describes as being situated
at the junction of the Euphrates and Sajur. He then marched to Aleppo,
where more gifts were brought to him, and after capturing three of the
fortresses of Hamath, reached the royal city of Karkar or Aroer. This, he
says, “I threw down, I dug up, I burned with fire; 1,200 chariots, 1,200
war-magazines, and 20,000 men belonging to Hadadezer of Damascus; 700
chariots, 700 war-magazines, and 10,000 men belonging to Irkhulina of
Hamath; 2,000 chariots and 10,000 men belonging to Ahab of Israel
(_Sirlâ_); 500 men of the Kuans; 1,000 men from Egypt; 10 chariots and
10,000 men from the land of Irkanat; 2,000 men belonging to Matinu-baal of
Arvad; 2,000 men from the land of Usanat; 30 chariots and 10,000 men
belonging to Adoni-baal of Sizan; 1,000 men belonging to Gindibuh of the
Arabians; and several hundred men belonging to Baasha, the son of Rehob,
of the Ammonites—these twelve kings led their troops to its help, and came
to make war and fighting against me. By the supreme help which Assur, the
lord, gave (me), with the mighty weapons which the great defender who went
before me lent (to me), I fought with them. From the city of Karkar, as
far as the city of Guzau I overthrew them. Fourteen thousand of their
fighting men I slew with weapons; like the Air-god I bade the storm issue
forth upon them; with their corpses I filled the face of the waters; their
vast armies I brought down with my weapons; there was not room enough in
the country for their dead bodies; to preserve the life of it I brought
back a vast multitude, and distributed them among its men. The banks of
the River Orontes I reached. In the midst of this battle I took away from
them their chariots, their war-magazines, and their horses trained to the
yoke.”
The first question that presents itself to us when we read this
inscription is how we are to reconcile the mention of Ahab in it with the
date of the battle of Karkar (B.C. 853). According to the chronology
adopted in the margin of our Bibles, Ahab would have been dead long before
the event. The Assyrian monuments, however, have proved that this
chronology exceeds the true one by more than forty years; and the date
assigned to Ahab by the inscription harmonises completely with the dates
that other inscriptions assign to later kings of Israel and Judah. In all
probability, the battle of Karkar took place shortly before Ahab’s death;
and it was no doubt in consequence of the defeat undergone there by the
Syrian forces that Ahab was not only enabled to shake off his subjection
to Damascus, but also to ally himself with Judah, and endeavour to recover
the frontier fortress of Ramoth, of which Israel had been robbed. The
alliance between Ahab and the king of Damascus is recorded in 1 Kings xx.
34. The battle of Karkar must have followed not very long afterwards,
since the attack on Ramoth was made within three years after the
conclusion of the alliance. Ahab’s death may, therefore, be placed in B.C.
851.
Another question that may be asked is how the Assyrian monarch can say
that twelve princes were arrayed in arms against him, when, according to
his own enumeration, the forces of only eleven nations were present, some
of which do not seem to have been under the command of any king. The only
answer that can be given is that Shalmaneser is guilty of a similar
arithmetical inaccuracy to that which makes him say that 14,000 of the
enemy fell in battle, whereas, according to other accounts, the number was
really 20,500; though it is possible that the latter number may include
the loss in other battles that took place during the campaign besides the
decisive one at Karkar. When, however, we find such arithmetical
corruptions as these in contemporaneous documents, we need not wonder that
the numerical statements of the Old Testament have become changed and
uncertain in their passage through the hands of generations of copyists.
We may infer from the fifth chapter of 2 Kings that the god Rimmon was the
chief object of worship of Hadadezer or Ben-hadad, the Syrian king. The
Assyrian inscriptions have shown us why this was so. Rimmon is the
Assyrian Ramman, the Air-god, and Ramman is specially identified with the
Syrian deity Hadad, whose name enters into that of Hadadezer.
Hadad-Rimmon, in fact, was the supreme divinity of Damascus, where he
represented, not the god of the air, as among the Assyrians, but Baal, the
Sun-god, himself. Hence it is that in Zechariah xii. 11, reference is made
to the “mourning of Hadad-Rimmon in the valley of Megiddo,” that is to
say, to the yearly festival, when the women mourned for the death of the
Sun-god, slain, as it was imagined, by the winter. In Phœnicia the god was
known as Adônis, the “lord,” or under his old Babylonian title of Tammuz.
It was for Tammuz, it will be remembered, that Ezekiel saw the women
sitting and weeping within the precincts of “the Lord’s house” itself in
Jerusalem (Ezek. viii. 14).
Hadadezer was murdered between the fourteenth and eighteenth years of
Shalmaneser, and the crown seized by Hazael. In his eighteenth year the
Assyrian king moved against the usurper, and captured his camp along with
1,121 chariots and 470 war-magazines. The battle took place on the summit
of Sanir or Shenir—the name given to Mount Hermon by the Amorites
according to Deut. iii. 9—“which lies over against Lebanon.” Here 16,000
of the Syrians fell in battle, and Hazael fled to Damascus, whither he was
followed by the Assyrians. Damascus, however, proved too strong to be
captured, and Shalmaneser accordingly contented himself with cutting down
the trees by which it was surrounded, and retiring into the Haurân, where
he burnt the unwalled towns, and carried away their inhabitants into
captivity. He then followed the high road from Damascus to the
Mediterranean, and on the promontory of Baal-rosh, at the mouth of the Dog
River, near Beyrût, had an image of himself carved upon the rocks. At the
same place he received the tribute of Tyre and Sidon, as well as of
“Yahua, the son of Khumri,” that is to say, of Jehu, the descendant of
Omri. In calling Jehu a descendant of Omri, the Assyrian king was
misinformed; he had heard nothing of the revolution which had extirpated
the house of Omri, and had placed Jehu upon the throne. Like Ahab,
therefore, Jehu was supposed to be a son of Omri, the founder of Samaria,
which is frequently termed Beth-Omri, “the house of Omri,” in the Assyrian
inscriptions, though in the later days of Tiglath-Pileser II and Sargon,
“Beth-Omri” is superseded by “Samirina.” This was the Aramaic form of the
native name—Shimrôn, and must consequently have been derived by the
Assyrians from the Aramaic neighbours of the Israelites.
In the Assyrian Hall of the British Museum there now stands a small
obelisk of black marble, which was brought from Calah by Sir A. H. Layard,
on which Shalmaneser records the annals of his reign. The upper portion of
the monument is occupied by a series of reliefs representing the tribute
brought to the Assyrian monarch by the distant nations which had sought
his favour. Among the reliefs is one in which the ambassadors of Jehu are
depicted bearing their offerings of gold and silver bars, of a golden vase
and a golden spoon, of cups and goblets of gold, of pieces of lead, of a
royal sceptre and of clubs of wood. Their features are those which are
still characteristic of the Jewish race, and their fringed robes descend
to their ankles.
The death of Shalmaneser brought with it a period of peace for Damascus
and Palestine. His son and successor turned his arms in other directions,
and Hazael and his successor, Ben-hadad III, were left free to ravage
Israel (2 Kings xiii. 3). It was not until the Israelites, under Jeroboam
II, had taken ample revenge upon the Syrians, and the coast of Israel was
restored “from the entering of Hamath unto the sea of the plain,” that an
Assyrian monarch once more marched towards the west. This was
Rimmon-nirari, grandson of Shalmaneser, who reigned from B.C. 810 to 781,
and reduced the kingdom of Damascus to a condition of vassalage. Damascus
was now under the government of a king called Marih, the successor,
probably, of Ben-hadad III, who, after undergoing a siege at the hands of
the Assyrians, was glad to make terms with them by acknowledging the
supremacy of Rimmon-nirari, and by giving him 2,300 talents of silver, 20
talents of gold, 3,000 talents of copper, 5,000 talents of iron,
embroidered robes and clothes of fine linen, a couch inlaid with ivory and
an ivory parasol, besides other treasures and furniture without number
which his palace contained. It is very possible that Jeroboam’s successes
against the Syrians were in large measure due to the extent to which they
had been weakened by the Assyrians. Rimmon-nirari also claims to have
received tribute from Tyre and Sidon, from Beth-Omri, from Edom, and from
Palastu or Palestine—a name under which we should probably include not
only the district inhabited by the Philistines, but the kingdom of Judah
as well. The tribute was no doubt sent to him after his triumphal entry
into Damascus.
With Rimmon-nirari the power of the older dynasty of the Assyrian kings
came to an end. His successors were scarcely able to defend themselves
against the attacks of their neighbours on the north and south; diseases
and insurrections broke out in the great cities of the kingdom, and
finally, in B.C. 746, there was a rising in Calah; the king either died or
was put to death, and before the year was over, in the month of April,
B.C. 745, the crown was seized by a military adventurer, named Pul, who
assumed the title of Tiglath-Pileser II. Tiglath-Pileser I had been the
most famous monarch and most extensive conqueror of the older dynasty, and
had reigned over Assyria five centuries previously; by assuming his name,
therefore, the usurper wished to show that he intended to emulate his
deeds. According to later tradition, the new king had begun his career as
a gardener; whether this were true or not, he showed great military and
executive capacities after he had established himself on the throne, and
it was to him that the second Assyrian empire owed its origin.
Tiglath-Pileser determined to cement the various states of Western Asia
into a single empire, governed by satraps appointed at Nineveh, and
accountable only to the king. Each satrapy, or province, had to provide a
certain number of men for the imperial army, and to pay a fixed annual
tribute to the imperial treasury. Thus, Nineveh itself was assessed at 30
talents, ten of which went to the general expenditure, while the remaining
twenty were devoted to the maintenance of the fleet. Calah paid 9 talents;
Carchemish, once the rich capital of the Hittites, paid 100; Arpad 30; and
Megiddo but 15. Besides gold and silver, the cities and provinces were
called upon to furnish chariots, clothing, and other similar
contributions.
Two years after his accession (B.C. 743) Tiglath-Pileser II turned his
attention to the west. Arpad, now Tel-Erfad, near Aleppo, was the first
object of attack. It held out for three years, and did not fall until B.C.
740. But, meanwhile, the kingdom of Hamath had been shattered by the
Assyrian arms. Nineteen of its districts were placed under Assyrian
governors, and the Assyrian forces made their way as far as the
Mediterranean Sea. Azri-yahu, or Azariah (Uzziah), the Jewish king, had
been the ally of Hamath, and from him also punishment was accordingly
exacted. He was compelled to purchase peace by the offer of submission and
the payment of tribute. The alliance between Judah and Hamath had been of
long standing. David had been the friend of its king Tou or Toi; and at
the beginning of Sargon’s reign the king of Hamath bears a distinctively
Jewish name. This is Yahu-bihdi, or, as it is elsewhere written,
Ilu-bihdi, where the word _ilu_, “god,” takes the place of the name of the
covenant God of Israel. It is even possible that Yahu-bihdi was a Jew who
had been placed on the throne of Hamath by Azariah. At any rate, the
alliance between Judah and Hamath explains a passage in 2 Kings xiv. 28,
which has long presented a difficulty. It is now clear that Jeroboam is
here stated to have won over Hamath to Israel, though previously it had
“been allied with Judah.” But after Jeroboam’s death, Jewish influence
must once more have gained an ascendency among the Hamathites.
Two years after the fall of Arpad, Tiglath-Pileser was again in the west.
On this occasion he held a _levée_ of subject princes, among whom Rezon of
Damascus and Manahem of Samaria came to offer their gifts and do homage to
their sovereign lord.(7) The tribute which Tiglath-Pileser states that he
then received from the Israelitish king was given, according to the Book
of Kings, to Pul. We may infer from this, therefore, that the Assyrian
monarch was still known to the neighbouring nations by his original name,
and that it was not until later that they became accustomed to the new
title he had assumed. The inference is further borne out by the statement
of an ancient Greek astronomer, Ptolemy. When speaking of the eclipses
which were observed at Babylon, Ptolemy gives a list of Babylonian kings,
with the length of their reigns, from the so-called era of Nabonassar, in
B.C. 747, down to the time of Alexander the Great. In this list,
Tiglath-Pileser, after his conquest of Babylon, is named Poros or Por, Por
being the Persian form of Pul.
During the lifetime of Menahem Israel remained tributary to Assyria, and
the Assyrian king did not again turn his arms against the west. After the
death of Menahem and the murder of his son Pekahiah, however, important
changes took place. The usurper, Pekah, in alliance with Rezon of
Damascus, attacked Judah with the intention of overthrowing the dynasty of
David and placing on the throne of Jerusalem a vassal king whose father’s
name, Tabeel, shows that he must have been a Syrian. Jotham, the Jewish
king, died shortly after the war began, and the youth and weakness of his
son and successor Ahaz laid Judah open to its antagonists, who were
further aided by a disaffected party within the capital itself (Isa. viii.
6). In his extremity, therefore, Ahaz appealed to the Assyrian monarch,
who was already seeking an excuse for crushing Damascus, and reducing the
Jewish kingdom, with its important fortress of Jerusalem, to a condition
of vassalage. In B.C. 734, accordingly, Tiglath-Pileser marched into
Syria. Rezon was defeated in a pitched battle, his chariots broken in
pieces, his captains captured and impaled, while he himself escaped to
Damascus, where he was closely besieged by the enemy. The territory of
Damascus was now devastated with fire and sword, its sixteen districts
were “overwhelmed as with a flood,” and the beautiful gardens by which the
capital was surrounded were destroyed, every tree being cut down for use
in the siege. The city itself, however, proved too strong to be taken by
assault; so, leaving a sufficient force before it to reduce it by famine,
Tiglath-Pileser proceeded against the late allies of the Syrian king.
Israel was the first to be attacked. The north of the country was overrun,
and the tribes beyond the Jordan carried into captivity. Gilead and
Abel-beth-maachah are mentioned by name as among the towns that were taken
and sacked.(8) The Assyrians then fell upon Ammon and Moab, which had
aided Israel and Syria in the attack on Judah, and next made their way
along the sea-coast into the country of the Philistines, who had seized
the opportunity of the late war to shake off the yoke of the Jewish king.
Their leader, Khanun or Hanno of Gaza, fled into Egypt; but Gaza itself
was captured and laid under tribute, its gods carried away, and an image
of the Assyrian king set up in the temple of Dagon. Ekron and Ashdod were
also punished, and Metinti of Ashkelon committed suicide in order to
escape the vengeance of the conqueror.
Now that all fear of danger in the south had been removed, Tiglath-Pileser
marched back into the northern kingdom, took Samaria, and (according to
his own account) put Pekah to death, appointing Hosea king in his place. A
yearly tribute of ten talents of gold and a thousand of silver was at the
same time exacted. Shortly afterwards some of the Assyrian troops were
sent against the Edomites and the Queen of the Arabs, who had also
revolted against Assyria and joined the Syro-Israelite league. Indeed,
this league seems to have been formed for the purpose of checking the
Assyrian advance, and the war against Judah to have been due to a refusal
of Jotham to take part in it. It was an anticipation of the league that
was afterwards formed in the time of Hezekiah against the growing power of
Sargon.
Meanwhile, after a siege of two years, Damascus fell in B.C. 732. Rezon
was slain, his subjects transported into captivity, and a great court,
like a durbar in modern India, was held in his palace by Tiglath-Pileser.
Among the subject-princes who attended it was Ahaz of Judah. He is called
Jehoahaz in the Assyrian inscriptions, and it is therefore clear that the
sacred historians have dropped the first part of the name, in consequence
of the character of the king. The divine name would have been profaned by
its association with an idolatrous and unworthy prince. As Khanun appeared
at the court along with Kavus-melech of Edom, Metinti of Ashkelon, Solomon
of Moab, and Sanib of Ammon, he must have succeeded in obtaining a pardon.
It was while Ahaz was at Damascus in attendance on the Assyrian monarch
that he saw the altar, the pattern of which he sent to Urijah, ordering it
to be set up in the court of the Lord’s house.
Tiglath-Pileser died in B.C. 727, and was succeeded by Shalmaneser IV. The
refusal of Hosea to continue the annual tribute brought the new Assyrian
monarch into the west. Tyre was besieged unsuccessfully, Hosea carried
away captive, and Samaria blockaded for three years. During the blockade
Shalmaneser died, and the crown was seized by one of the Assyrian
generals. The latter assumed the name of Sargon, in memory of the famous
Babylonian monarch who had reigned so many centuries before. The capture
of Samaria took place in his first year (B.C. 722); 27,280 of its
inhabitants were sent into exile, but only fifty chariots were found in
the city. An Assyrian governor was appointed over it, who was commissioned
to send each year to Nineveh the same tribute as that paid by Hosea. The
comparatively small number of Israelites who were carried into captivity
shows that Sargon contented himself with removing only those persons and
their families who had taken part in the revolt against him; in fact,
Samaria was treated pretty much as Jerusalem was by Nebuchadrezzar in the
time of Jehoiachin. The greater part of the old population was allowed to
remain in its native land. This fact disposes of the modern theories which
assume that the whole of the Ten Tribes were carried away. The districts
to which the captives were taken were Halah, the banks of the Habor, or
river of Gozan, and the cities of the Medes. Halah was not far from Haran
in Mesopotamia, on the western side of the Habor, the modern Khabur, which
flows into the Euphrates, and rises in the country called Guzana, or
Gozan, in the Assyrian inscriptions. The Medes were the tribes who lived
eastward of Kurdistan, which, like Mesopotamia, had been overrun by
Tiglath-Pileser.
The places of the captive Israelites were not supplied immediately. We
learn from the Old Testament that it was from Hamath and the cities of
Babylonia that the new inhabitants were brought. Now Hamath was not
conquered by Sargon until B.C. 720, and Babylonia not until B.C. 710.
Hamath had broken into revolt under Yahu-bihdi or Ilu-bihdi, who induced
Arpad, Damascus, and Samaria to follow its example. But its chastisement
was speedy and sharp. Sargon captured Ilu-bihdi in the city of Aroer, and
flayed him alive; while Hamath received a colony of 4,300 Assyrians and an
Assyrian governor. Samaria was next punished, and Sargon then marched
southward against the combined forces of Khanun of Gaza and Sabako or So
of Egypt. A battle at Raphia decided the fate of the struggle, and Khanun
fell into the hands of his enemies.
The Babylonian cities from which some of the new settlers in Samaria were
taken were Cuthah and Sepharvaim. Cuthah is now represented by the mounds
of Tel Ibrahim, to the north-west of Babylon. It was under the special
protection of Nergal, whose name means “the lord of the great city,” the
god of the under-world. Sepharvaim, or “the two Sipparas,” stood on
opposite banks of the Euphrates. The quarter on the eastern bank, now
called Abu-Habba, was Sippara proper, where, according to Babylonian
tradition, Sisuthros had buried his books before the Deluge; the quarter
on the other bank being Agadé or Accad, the old capital of Sargon I, which
gave its name to the whole of the northern portion of Chaldea. In later
times the two quarters were distinguished from one another as “Sippara of
Samas,” the Sun-god, and “Sippara of Anunit.” Anunit was the wife of the
god Anu, “the sky”; and when the Bible says that “the Sepharvites burnt
their children in fire to Anammelech” reference is made to “Anu the king.”
Adrammelech, or “Adar the king,” was another Babylonian deity, who was
originally a form of the Sun-god.
We may gather from Ezra iv. 2, 10, that Samaria was colonised a second
time by the Assyrians, perhaps in consequence of an unsuccessful revolt.
This took place in the reign of Esar-haddon. His son Asnapper, or
Assur-bani-pal, settled a number of Elamite tribes in the country, among
them being natives of Susa and of Apharsa or Mal Amir. Men from Babylon
and Erech were also settled there at the same time. The names of the new
colonists would suit the reign of Assur-bani-pal better than that of
Esar-haddon, since it was Assur-bani-pal, and not Esar-haddon, who
conquered Elam and Susa, and took by storm both Babylon and Erech. It is,
therefore, probable that Esar-haddon in verse 2 is a scribe’s error for
Asnapper.
The reduction of the northern kingdom of Israel into an Assyrian province
brought the Assyrian empire to the very borders of Judah, and the Assyrian
kings began to cast longing eyes upon the territory of the latter. Its
capital, Jerusalem, was an almost impregnable fortress, the possession of
which would open the road into Egypt, as well as block the passage of an
Egyptian army into Asia. But as yet there was no excuse for attacking it.
Hezekiah, the successor of Ahaz, continued to pay the tribute his father
had consented to give to the Assyrians, and Sargon accordingly occupied
himself in wars elsewhere. Suddenly, however, an event occurred which
brought him once more into Palestine. In order to understand this, we must
turn our eyes for a moment or two to Babylonia.
The Babylonians had seized the opportunity offered by the death of
Tiglath-Pileser to shake off the Assyrian yoke. For five years they
remained free. Then in B.C. 722 the country was occupied by a man of great
energy and ability, Merodach-baladan, the son of Yagina.(9)
Merodach-baladan was the hereditary chief of the Kaldâ or Chaldeans, a
small tribe at that time settled in the marshes at the mouth of the
Euphrates, but which, in consequence of his conquest of Babylon
afterwards, became the dominant caste in Babylonia itself. For twelve
years he continued undisputed master of the country we may henceforth call
Chaldea. Sargon, however, was becoming every year more powerful, and it
was evident that another Assyrian invasion of Babylonia would not be long
postponed. Merodach-baladan determined to anticipate the attack. He
therefore endeavoured to form a vast league between the states on both the
eastern and the western sides of the Assyrian empire, whose independence
was menaced by their powerful neighbour. Babylonia and Elam were the
eastern members of the league, and ambassadors were sent to the west, to
concert measures with the various states of Palestine, as well as with
Egypt, for common action against Sargon.
Hezekiah, now in the fourteenth year of his reign (2 Kings xx. 6), had
just recovered from a dangerous illness, which had been aggravated by the
fear of Assyria, and the fact that as yet he had no son to succeed him.
The illness formed the pretext by which the conspirators hoped to blind
the eyes of Sargon to the real objects of the embassy; it was published to
the world that the ambassadors had come merely to congratulate the Jewish
king on his recovery. But Sargon knew well that Merodach-baladan would not
have troubled himself to enquire after the health of a brother-king
without a further motive, and he doubtless learned that Hezekiah had shown
the ambassadors all the treasures and arms with which he hoped to support
the league. The consequence was, that before the confederates were
prepared to resist him, the Assyrian monarch had swooped down upon them
and attacked them singly.
Palestine was the first to suffer. Akhimit, whom Sargon had appointed king
of Ashdod, had been dethroned, and the crown given to an usurper named
Yavan or “the Greek.” Yavan seems to have been the nominee of Hezekiah,
who at this time exercised a sort of suzerainty over the Philistine
cities, and he was set up as king for the purpose of heading the
Philistine revolt against Assyria. Edom and Moab also sent contingents to
the war, and the Ethiopian king of Egypt promised help. Of the details of
the struggle between Sargon and the western states we unfortunately know
nothing. But it did not last long; neither Babylonia nor Egypt had time to
send any assistance to their allies. The _Tartan_ or Commander-in-chief
was ordered to invest Ashdod (see Isa. xx. 1), while Sargon himself
overran “the wide-spreading land of Judah,” and captured its capital
Jerusalem. This conquest of Judah by Sargon explains prophecies of Isaiah
which have hitherto been unsolved mysteries. Thus an explanation is at
length offered of the circumstances described by the prophet in chapters
x. and xi. Here the Assyrian army is described as marching along the usual
high-road from the north-east, and as halting at Nob, only an hour’s
journey distant from Jerusalem, on the very day when the oracle was
uttered,(10) while Isaiah declares that the capital itself shall fall into
the hands of the enemy (x. 6, 12, 22, 24, 34).
All this is inapplicable to the invasion of Sennacherib, when a detachment
only of the Assyrian army was sent against Jerusalem from the south-west,
and when Isaiah was commissioned by God to promise that the king of
Assyria should “not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow there, nor
come before it with shield, nor cast a bank against it.” The older
commentators were accordingly driven to the desperate expedient of
supposing that the invasion described by Isaiah in the tenth chapter of
his prophecies was an ideal one. Thanks, however, to the decipherment of
the cuneiform inscriptions, all is now clear, and we can now understand
why it is that the Assyrian monarch, whose march is described by Isaiah,
claims to be the conqueror of Calno and Carchemish, of Hamath and Arpad,
of Damascus and Samaria (w. 8-10). All these were conquests of Sargon, not
of Sennacherib.
Ashdod was taken and razed to the ground, and its inhabitants sold into
captivity. Yavan managed to escape to the Egyptian king, who was cowardly
enough to give him up to his enemies. Edom and Moab were punished for the
part they had taken in the rebellion, and the authority of Sargon was
paramount as far as the frontier of Egypt.
All this happened in B.C. 711. The following year the whole power of
Assyria was hurled against Merodach-baladan. The Elamites were defeated
and their border-towns sacked, and the Babylonian king was compelled to
retreat southwards, leaving Babylon in the hands of the Assyrians. A year
later he was pursued by Sargon into his last refuge; Bit-Yagina, his
ancestral capital, was taken by storm, and he himself forced to surrender.
His good fortune never returned. On Sargon’s death he once more entered
Babylon, but his second reign only lasted six months. After a battle which
ended in the complete victory of Sennacherib, he fled again to the
marshes, but was driven out of them four years later, and sailed across
the Persian Gulf to find a new home on the western coast of Elam. But even
here his implacable enemies followed him. In B.C. 697, Sennacherib manned
a fleet with Phœnician sailors and destroyed the town the old Chaldean
prince had built. After this we hear of him no more.
The tenth chapter of Isaiah teaches us to look for references to the
capture of Jerusalem by Sargon in other parts of the book. It is
impossible not to recognise one of these in the twenty-second chapter.
Here the prophet presents us with the picture of a siege which has already
lasted some time, and when the inhabitants of Jerusalem are no longer
slain by the sword, but by famine, while the city is on the point of being
starved out. Here also the message which Isaiah is bidden to deliver is
not a promise of deliverance from the enemy, but the reverse: “It was
revealed in my ears by the Lord of Hosts, surely this iniquity shall not
be purged from you till ye die, saith the Lord God of Hosts.” It is only
the campaign of Sargon that can explain these words.
Ten years later Judah was again invaded by an Assyrian king, and Jerusalem
again threatened by an Assyrian army. Sargon had been murdered by his
soldiers, and succeeded by his son, Sennacherib, who mounted the throne on
the 12th of the month of Ab, or July, B.C. 705. He was a very different
man from his father, weak and vain-glorious, fonder of boasting than of
deeds. Trusting to the support of Tirhakah, the Ethiopian king of Egypt,
Hezekiah threw off his allegiance to Assyria, and refused to send the
yearly tribute to Nineveh. The Phœnicians did the same, while the Jewish
king reasserted his former supremacy over the cities of the Philistines.
Padi, the king of Ekron, who remained faithful to Assyria, was carried in
chains to Jerusalem, and Zedekiah, who is named in the Assyrian records as
the king of Ashkelon, was probably of Jewish origin. It was not until
three years after his accession that Sennacherib found himself able to
march against the rebels. In B.C. 701 he crossed the Euphrates, and made
his way to the shores of the Mediterranean. Great and Little Sidon,
Sarepta, Acre, and other Phœnician towns, surrendered to the invader, the
Sidonian monarch fled to Cyprus, and the kings of Arvad and Gebal hastened
to pay their court to the conquerer. Metinti of Ashdod, Pedael of Ammon,
Chemosh-nadad of Moab, and Melech-ram of Edom, who were also suspected of
having taken part in the rebellion, came at the same time. Judah and the
dependent Philistine states alone still held out.
The rest of the history had best be told in Sennacherib’s own words.
“Zedekiah, king of Ashkelon,” he says, “who had not submitted to my yoke,
himself, the gods of the house of his fathers, his wife, his sons, his
daughters and his brothers, the seed of the house of his fathers, I
removed, and I sent him to Assyria. I set over the men of Ashkelon,
Sarludari, the son of Rukipti, their former king, and I imposed upon him
the payment of tribute, and the homage due to my majesty, and he became a
vassal. In the course of my campaign I approached and captured Beth-Dagon,
Joppa, Bene-berak and Azur, the cities of Zedekiah, which did not submit
at once to my yoke, and I carried away their spoil. The priests, the chief
men, and the common people of Ekron, who had thrown into chains their king
Padi because he was faithful to his oaths to Assyria, and had given him up
to Hezekiah, the Jew, who imprisoned him like an enemy in a dark dungeon,
feared in their hearts. The king of Egypt, the bowmen, the chariots and
the horses of the king of Ethiopia, had gathered together innumerable
forces and gone to their assistance. In sight of the town of Eltekeh was
their order of battle drawn up; they called their troops (to the battle).
Trusting in Assur, my lord, I fought with them and overthrew them. My
hands took the captains of the chariots and the sons of the king of Egypt,
as well as the captains of the chariots of the king of Ethiopia, alive in
the midst of the battle. I approached and captured the towns of Eltekeh
and Timnath, and I carried away their spoil. I marched against the city of
Ekron, and put to death the priests and the chief men who had committed
the sin (of rebellion), and I hung up their bodies on stakes all round the
city. The citizens who had done wrong and wickedness I counted as a spoil;
as for the rest of them who had done no sin or crime, in whom no fault was
found, I proclaimed their freedom (from punishment). I had Padi, their
king, brought out from the midst of Jerusalem, and I seated him on the
throne of royalty over them, and I laid upon him the tribute due to my
majesty. But as for Hezekiah of Judah, who had not submitted to my yoke,
forty-six of his strong cities, together with innumerable fortresses and
small towns which depended on them, by overthrowing the walls and open
attack, by battle, engines and battering-rams I besieged, I captured. I
brought out from the midst of them and counted as a spoil 200,150 persons,
great and small, male and female, horses, mules, asses, camels, oxen and
sheep without number. Hezekiah himself I shut up like a bird in a cage in
Jerusalem, his royal city. I built a line of forts against him, and I kept
back his heel from going forth out of the great gate of his city. I cut
off his cities which I had spoiled from the midst of his land, and gave
them to Metinti, king of Ashdod, Padi, king of Ekron, and Zil-baal, king
of Gaza, and I made his country small. In addition to their former tribute
and yearly gifts I added other tribute, and the homage due to my majesty,
and I laid it upon them. The fear of the greatness of my majesty
overwhelmed him, even Hezekiah, and he sent after me to Nineveh, my royal
city, by way of gift and tribute, the Arabs and his body-guard whom he had
brought for the defence of Jerusalem, his royal city, and had furnished
with pay, along with thirty talents of gold, 800 talents of pure silver,
carbuncles and other precious stones, a couch of ivory, thrones of ivory,
an elephant’s hide, an elephant’s tusk, rare woods, whatever their names,
a vast treasure, as well as the eunuchs of his palace, dancing men and
dancing women; and he sent his ambassador to offer homage.”
The Assyrian and the Biblical accounts complete and supplement one
another. Sennacherib naturally glosses over the disaster that befel him in
Palestine, and transfers the payment of the tribute from the time when
Hezekiah vainly hoped to buy off the siege of Jerusalem to the end of the
campaign. But he cannot conceal the fact that he never succeeded in taking
the revolted city or in punishing Hezekiah, as he had punished other rebel
kings, nor did he again undertake a campaign in the west. We find him the
next year in Babylonia; then he attacked the tribes of Cilicia; but he
never again ventured into Palestine. During the rest of his lifetime Judah
had nothing more to fear from the Assyrian king.
At first sight there seems to be a discrepancy between the number of
silver talents stated in the Bible to have been paid by Hezekiah, and the
number which Sennacherib claims to have received. But the discrepancy is
only an apparent one. It has been shown that there were two standards of
value, according to one of which 500 talents of silver would be equivalent
to 800 talents, if reckoned by the other. A more real discrepancy is to be
found in the statement of Sennacherib that he had built a line of forts
round about Jerusalem, and prevented Hezekiah from getting out of it. This
is in flagrant contradiction to the words of Isaiah, that the Assyrian
king should not shoot an arrow into Jerusalem, nor assault it under the
cover of shields, nor cast a bank against it. Sennacherib claims to have
performed more than he actually did.
Another discrepancy has been found in the date assigned by the Biblical
narrative to the Assyrian invasion. The year B.C. 701 was the
twenty-fourth year of Hezekiah, not the fourteenth, which fell in B.C.
711, the year of Sargon’s campaign. But this very fact supplies an
explanation of the difficulty. In the retrospective record of the
prophetical annalist, the two campaigns of Sargon and Sennacherib have
been brought into association, though the history dwells only upon that
one which illustrated God’s way of dealing with His faithful servants.
Hence it is that reminiscences of the earlier invasion are allowed to
enter here and there into the narrative. It was Sargon, and not
Sennacherib, who was the conqueror of Hamath and Arpad, of Sepharvaim and
Samaria (2 Kings xviii. 34-36). It was Sargon, and not Sennacherib, who
invaded Judah in the fourteenth year of Hezekiah’s reign.
There is a bas-relief in the British Museum which represents Sennacherib
seated on his throne in front of Lachish, and receiving the spoil of the
city as it passed before him. It was while he was encamped before this
city that Hezekiah despatched the embassy with gifts and tribute and
prayers for pardon. Sennacherib accepted the gifts, but refused the
pardon; nothing would content him but the absolute surrender of Jerusalem
and its king. Hezekiah then prepared for his defence. We gather from
Isaiah’s writings that there were at that period three parties in the
State, each of which at different times gained an influence over the king
and his councillors. There was first the party headed by Shebna—whose name
proves him to have been of Syrian parentage—which advocated alliance with
Egypt and hostility to Assyria. This was the party with which Isaiah had
mainly to contend, but its power was not finally extinguished until after
the retreat of Tirhakah from the battle of Eltekeh, and this visible proof
that Egypt was but a bruised reed to lean upon. The second party inherited
the policy of Ahaz, and urged that Judah’s only chance of safety lay in
submission to the mighty Empire of Assyria. Isaiah was the representative
of the third party. He announced God’s own declaration, that He would
defend His city and temple if only its inhabitants would trust and fear
Him, and reject all alliances with the heathen nations that surrounded
them. “In quietness and in confidence” should be their strength. It was
not until events had demonstrated the truth of Isaiah’s message that the
rulers of Jerusalem reluctantly accepted it, and recognised at last that
the true policy of Judah was to abstain from mixing in the wars and
intrigues of the foreign idolater.
When the Jewish embassy arrived at Lachish, the Egyptian party seems still
to have been in the ascendant. In spite of the prophet’s warning, envoys
had been sent to Egypt (Isa. xxx. xxxi.), and had returned full of
confidence in an alliance, which yet was to be to them not “an help nor
profit, but a shame and also a reproach.” The battle of Eltekeh dissipated
their hopes. This was fought after the capture of Lachish, when
Sennacherib was endeavouring to take the neighbouring fortress of Libnah
(2 Kings xix. 8, 9). The Rab-shakeh or Prime Minister had been sent
against Jerusalem along with the Tartan or Commander-in-chief and the
Rab-saris or Chamberlain, and after delivering his message to its
defenders had returned to Sennacherib, leaving a considerable force under
the Tartan encamped outside its walls. The message had been delivered in
Hebrew, not in Assyrian or in Aramaic (Syrian), which at that time was the
general language of trade and diplomacy in Western Asia, like French in
modern Europe. Every politician was expected to speak it, and Hezekiah’s
ministers take it for granted that the Rab-shakeh would be able to do so.
The fact that he preferred to speak in Hebrew gives us a high idea of the
education of the age. Every cultivated Assyrian was acquainted with
Accadian, the old dead language of Babylonia, which was to an Assyrian
what Latin is to us; and in addition to this diplomatists and men of
business were required to know Aramaic, while we here find the highest of
Assyrian officials further able to converse in Hebrew.
A reminiscence of the disaster which befel the Assyrian army was preserved
in an Egyptian legend, which ascribed it to the piety of an Egyptian king.
Influenced by this legend, some scholars have supposed that it took place
at Pelusium, on the Egyptian frontier; but the language of Scripture seems
hardly to leave a doubt that it really happened before Jerusalem. The
result was the abrupt breaking up of the Assyrian camp and the termination
of the siege of Jerusalem. Sennacherib hastened back to Nineveh, and the
court annalists were bidden to draw a veil of silence over the conclusion
of the campaign.
Hezekiah did not long survive his wonderful deliverance. Next to Solomon
he seems to have been the most cultivated of the Jewish kings. His public
works rendered Jerusalem one of the most formidable fortresses of the
ancient world; and if the tunnel of Siloam belongs to his reign, it is
clear that he had at his disposal engineering skill of a high order. He
was not only himself a poet, but a restorer of the old psalmody and a
patron of literature. In imitation, probably, of the libraries of Assyria
and Babylonia, he established a library in Jerusalem, where scribes were
employed, as they were at Nineveh, in making new editions of ancient works
(see Prov. xxv. 1.). Ahaz had introduced into Judah the study of
astronomy, for which the Babylonians were renowned, and had set up a
gnomon or sun-dial in the palace-court (2 Kings xx. 11). It is possible
that some of the astronomical literature of Babylonia, which has been
recovered from the cuneiform tablets now in the British Museum, was
introduced at the same time, with its multitudinous observations and
prediction of eclipses, its notices of the appearance of comets, of the
movements of the planets and fixed stars, of the phases of Venus, and even
of spots on the sun. It is also possible that the Assyrian calendar and
the Assyrian names of the months now first became familiar to the Jews. At
any rate, it would seem, from Jer. xxiii. 10, 11, that clay came to be
used in Judah as a writing material, just as it was at Babylon or Nineveh,
the inner clay record of a contract being covered with an outer coating,
on which was inscribed an abstract of its contents, together with the
names of the witnesses. Jeremiah’s deed of purchase, moreover, was
preserved in a jar, like the numerous clay deeds of the Egibi
banking-firm, which existed at Babylon from the age of Nebuchadrezzar to
that of Xerxes. These jars served the purpose of our modern safes.
Sennacherib lived for twenty years after his withdrawal from Palestine. In
B.C. 681 he was murdered by his two elder sons, Adar-melech and
Nergal-sharezer, who were jealous of the favour shown by him towards their
younger brother Esar-haddon. A curious evidence of this favour exists
among the tablets in the British Museum. This is nothing less than the
will of Sennacherib, made apparently some years before his death, in which
he bequeaths to Esar-haddon certain private property. The document reads
as follows:—“I, Sennacherib, king of multitudes, king of Assyria, bequeath
armlets of gold, quantities of ivory, a platter of gold, ornaments, and
chains for the neck, all these beautiful things of which there are heaps,
and three sorts of precious stones, one and a half manehs and two and a
half shekels in weight, to Esar-haddon my son, whose name was afterwards
changed to Assur-sar-illik-pal by my wish. The treasure is deposited in
the house of Amuk.” The king was excused the necessity of having his will
attested by witnesses, as was obligatory in the case of other persons; and
it is plain that at the time when it was made Esar-haddon was not the
recognised heir to the throne.
The murder of the old king took place, according to the Bible, “as he was
worshipping in the house of Nisroch his god.” The reading of the god’s
name, however, is corrupt, since no such deity was known to the Assyrians,
and it is possible that Nusku, the companion of Nebo, the patron of
literature, is intended. A war was going on at the time between Assyria
and Armenia, and the murderers finding, apparently, no adherents in
Nineveh, fled to Erimenas, the Armenian king. Esar-haddon, at the head of
the Assyrian veterans, met them and the Armenian forces, a few weeks
afterwards, at a place not far from Melitene, the modern Malatiyeh, in
Kappadokia. The battle ended in the complete victory of the Assyrians, and
Esar-haddon was saluted “king” on the spot by his soldiers. He then
returned to Nineveh, and there formally ascended the throne.
Esar-haddon resembled his father but little. He was one of the ablest
generals Assyria ever produced, and was distinguished from his
predecessors by his mild and conciliatory policy. Under him the Assyrian
empire reached its furthest limits, Egypt being conquered, and placed
under twenty Assyrian satraps, while an Assyrian army penetrated into the
very heart of the Arabian desert. But the conquests which had been won in
war were cemented by a policy of justice and moderation. Thus Babylon,
which had been razed to the ground by Sennacherib in B.C. 691, and the
adjoining river choked with its ruins, was rebuilt, and Esar-haddon
endeavoured to win over the Babylonians by residing in it during half the
year. This affords an explanation of a fact mentioned in the Second Book
of Chronicles (xxxiii. 11), which has long been a stumbling-block in the
way of critics. It is there said that the king of Assyria, after crushing
the revolt of Manasseh, carried him away captive to Babylon. The cause of
this is now clear. As Esar-haddon spent part of his time at Babylon it
merely depended on the season of the year to which of his two capitals,
Nineveh or Babylon, a political prisoner should be brought. The treatment
of Manasseh was in full accordance with the treatment of other rebel
princes in the time of Esar-haddon’s son, Assur-bani-pal. Like them, he
was at first loaded with chains, but was afterwards allowed to return to
his kingdom and reinstated in the government of it.
The name of “Manasseth, king of Judah,” twice occurs on the Assyrian
monuments. Once he is mentioned among the tributaries of Esar-haddon, once
among those of Assur-bani-pal. It is clear, therefore, that at some period
shortly after Hezekiah’s death, Judah was again forced to pay tribute and
do homage to the Assyrian king. When Esar-haddon passed through Palestine
on his way to Egypt, he found there only submission and respect. Sidon
alone withstood him, and Sidon was accordingly destroyed.
The “burden” pronounced upon Egypt by Isaiah (ch. xix.) must belong to the
age of Esar-haddon. The condition of Egypt at the time was exactly that
described by the prophet. The country was divided into hostile kingdoms,
which fought “every one against his brother, and every one against his
neighbour; city against city, and kingdom against kingdom.” Tirhakah the
Ethiopian, whom the Assyrians had driven out, invaded it from the south,
and Esar-haddon came down upon it from the north. He it is who is “the
fierce king” who, the Lord declared, should rule over the Egyptians. For
about twenty years the unhappy country was wasted with fire and sword. The
twenty governors appointed by the Assyrians were constantly intriguing
against one another and their suzerain; and again and again the Assyrian
armies were called upon to return to Egypt to suppress a revolt. It was
during one of these campaigns—that which happened about B.C. 665, in the
reign of Assur-bani-pal—that Thebes, the ancient capital of Upper Egypt,
was destroyed. It is termed Ni in the Assyrian texts, a name which
corresponds to the Hebrew No-Amon, or No of Amun, the supreme god of the
city. Its temples and palaces were overthrown, their treasures were
carried away, and two obelisks, which together weighed over seventy tons,
were sent as trophies to Nineveh. Nahum (iii. 8) alludes to this
destruction of Thebes as a recent event, and thus fixes the approximate
age of his life and ministry.
The reign of Esar-haddon was a short one. In B.C. 670, on the 12th day of
Iyyar, or April, he convened by edict a great assembly in Nineveh, and
there associated his son Assur-bani-pal, whom the Greeks called
Sardanapalus, in the government. Two years later he died, and
Assur-bani-pal was proclaimed sole king on the 27th of Ab, or July.
Assur-bani-pal, the _grand monarque_ of Assyria, whose long reign was a
continuous series of wars, and building, and magnificent patronage of art
and literature, has little direct contact with Biblical history. The
conquest of Elam by his generals removed the last civilized power which
could struggle with Assyria; but it was not fully accomplished when the
mighty empire began to totter to its fall. A general rebellion broke out,
at the heart of which was Assur-bani-pal’s own brother, the viceroy of
Babylonia. All the strength of Assyria was spent in crushing it; and
Egypt, which had revolted through the help of Gyges of Lydia, was never
reconquered. Palestine, strangely enough, seems to have been but little
affected by the almost universal outbreak; indeed, Chemosh-khalta of Moab
materially assisted Assur-bani-pal, by defeating the Kedarites and sending
their sheikh in chains to Nineveh. One or two Phœnician cities alone took
occasion to refuse their tribute. We do not know the year of
Assur-bani-pal’s death, but it was probably about B.C. 630. He left a
troubled heritage to his successors. The viceroy of Babylonia was becoming
more and more independent; Elam, the latest Assyrian conquest, was
threatened by the Persians, and a new and ferocious enemy had appeared in
the north. These were the Scythians, who had descended upon the civilised
world from the steppes of Southern Russia. They extended their ravages as
far as Palestine, and their occupation of Beth-Shan caused it to be known
in later days as Scythopolis, “the city of the Scythians.” The earlier
prophecies of Jeremiah refer to the miseries inflicted on the country by
these barbarians, who must have entered it towards the middle of Josiah’s
reign. By this time the authority of Assyria in the west could have been
but nominal. Nineveh itself had undergone a siege at the hands of the
Medes, and was only saved from utter destruction by the Scythian
irruption. Hence we can understand how it was that Josiah was able to
re-unite the monarchy of David, and extend his sway over what had once
been the kingdom of Samaria. There was no longer an Assyrian governor to
forbid his overthrowing the altar at Bethel or the “houses of the high
places that were in the cities of Samaria.”
The date of the final fall and destruction of Nineveh is not certain, and
much depends on the interpretation given to the words “the king of
Assyria” in 2 Kings xxiii. 29. If, as is usually supposed, these really
signify the king of Babylon, who had succeeded to the power of Assyria, we
may place the fall of the Assyrian capital in B.C. 610; otherwise the date
must be as late as B.C. 606. It cannot be later, since, when Jeremiah
reviews in this year the existing nations of the east (xxv. 19-26), he
says not a word about either Nineveh or Assyria. The vengeance the
prophets had predicted for the Assyrians had already fallen upon them.
What it was to be like we may gather from the language of Nahum.
The last king of Assyria was Esar-haddon II, called Sarakos by the Greek
writers. He has left us a few records, which were written when his enemies
were gathering about him, and when his people were vainly calling upon
their gods for help. The Medes, the Minni, the Kimmerians or Gomer, had
all banded themselves together, and were steadily approaching Nineveh. The
frontier cities had been stormed, and the enemy was spreading like an
inundation over the whole country. In their despair the Assyrian rulers
ordained a solemn fast of 100 days and 100 nights, and besought the
Sun-god to pardon their sin. But all was in vain. The measure of the
iniquities of Assyria was filled up; the time had come when the desolater
should himself be desolate, and Nineveh, as God’s prophets had threatened,
was laid utterly waste.(11)