The History of Antiquity, Vol. 3 (of 6)

The History of Antiquity, Vol. 3 (of 6)
Evelyn Abbott

Max Duncker

Max Duncker

The History of Antiquity, Vol. 3 (of 6)

CHAPTER I.

THE CAMPAIGNS OF TIGLATH PILESAR II

In the course of the ninth century B.C. the power of Assyria had made considerable progress. In addition to the ancient dependencies on the upper Zab and the upper Tigris, in Armenia and Mesopotamia, the principalities and cities on the middle Euphrates had been reduced, the region of the Amanus had been won. Cilicia had been trodden by Assyrian armies, Damascus was humbled, Syria had felt the weight of the arms of Assyria in a number of campaigns; the kingdom of Israel and the cities of the Phenicians had repeatedly brought their tribute to the warlike princes of Nineveh; at length even the cities of the Philistines and the Edomites could not escape a similar payment. Tiglath Pilesar I. had seen the great sea of the West, the Mediterranean; three centuries later Bin-nirar III. received the tribute of all the harbour cities of the Syrian coast, the great centres of trade on this sea. Nor was it to the West only that the power of the Assyrians advanced. Shalmanesar II. and Bin-nirar III. gained the supremacy over Babylon, the ancient mother-country of Assyria. Each offered sacrifices at Babylon, Borsippa, and Kutha; while to the North-west the power of Assyria extended beyond Media as far as the shores of the Caspian Sea.

The successors of Bin-nirar III. were not able to sustain their power at this height. Shalmanesar III. (781-771 B.C.) had again to fight against Damascus and Hadrach (in the neighbourhood of Damascus[1 - The older Zachariah mentions the land of Hadrach beside Damascus and Hamath, Zech. ix. 1, 2.]); in his short reign of ten years he marched six times against the land of Ararat (Urarti). Assur-danil III. (771-753 B.C.), the successor of Shalmanesar III., also fought against Hadrach and Arpad (now Tel Erfad, near Hamath[2 - Fifteen miles to the north-west of Aleppo the ruin-heaps at Tel Erfad mark the site of the ancient Arpad; Kiepert, "Z.D.M.G." 25, 665.]). He had, moreover, to suppress disturbances which had broken out on the upper Zab in Arrapachitis (Arapha), and in the land of Guzan (Gauzanitis) on the Chaboras. In the reign of Assur-nirar II. (753-745 B.C.) there were risings in Assyria, even in Chalah, the metropolis.[3 - A document has been preserved from the reign of Assur-nirar, belonging to the year 747 B.C., regarding the lease of a piece of land; Oppert et Ménant, "Docum. Juridiq." p. 151.] But the prince who succeeded Assur-nirar II. on the throne of Assyria, Tiglath Pilesar II., was able not merely to raise the kingdom to the position which it had occupied under Shalmanesar II. and Bin-nirar III., but to make it a predominant power over a still wider circuit.

The armies of Shalmanesar II. had invaded Media; among the tribute brought to him by the land of Mushri we found camels with two humps, buffaloes, (yaks) and elephants. After a successful campaign against Babylon, which he undertook immediately after his accession, Tiglath Pilesar led his army to the table-land of Iran, and forced his way to the East.[4 - The list of rulers represents him as marching to the stream, i. e. to the Euphrates, immediately after his accession, and afterwards to the land of Namri, i. e. to the Zagrus.] A tablet discovered at Chalah, which gives a summary of Tiglath Pilesar's achievements from the first to the seventeenth year of his reign, mentions the districts subjugated in this direction. It is a long list, beginning with the land of Namri.[5 - G. Smith reads Zimri.] The districts of Parsua, Zikruti, Nisaa, and Arakuttu are mentioned,[6 - Nissi in G. Smith, "Disc." p. 260, but in frag. 4 Nissa.] and the enumeration concludes with districts in the wilds of Media.[7 - So according to G. Smith [who reads Likruti].] The king defeated the numerous warriors of this region; "60,500 of their people, children, horses, asses, mules, oxen, and sheep without number I carried away."[8 - Ll. 29-33 in G. Smith, "Disc." p. 260; Ménant, "Annal." pp. 142, 143.] Such are the words of the inscription, which proceeds: "I took possession of the land of Namri anew, and the land of Parsua." With these regions thirteen districts already mentioned are again enumerated. "Zikruti in rugged Media I added to the land of Assyria; the cities I built up anew; in them I placed warriors of Asshur, my lord, and people whom my hand had taken captive. I received the tribute of Media, of Ellip, and all the princes of the mountains to Bikni; horses, asses, mules, oxen, sheep without number. My general, Assurdainani, I sent into rugged Media towards the rising of the sun. He brought back 5000 horses, oxen, sheep without number."[9 - Ll. 34-42, in G. Smith, "Disc." p. 261; Ménant, loc. cit. 143. The words "I possessed anew" are wanting in G. Smith; cf. Lenormant, "Z. Ægypt. Sprache," 1870, s. 48 ff. The statement about the subjugation of Bit Hamban and the regions which follow, ll. 34-37, is repeated in the inscription in Layard, pp. 17, 18, l. 17; in Ménant, loc. cit. 139. The statement about the campaign of Assurdainani is repeated in frag. 4, p. 271 in G. Smith, loc. cit.]

According to this inscription Tiglath Pilesar, on his first campaign against Iran, which we may place, on the authority of the list of rulers, in the year 745 or 744 B.C.,[10 - This gives 745-744 B.C.: Bildanil. To the land of Namri; cf. frag. 3 in G. Smith, "Disc." p. 269.] though he failed to reach Bactria and the Indus, forced his way into the eastern regions of Iran as far as the further shore of lake Hamun. The meaning of the names Nisaa, Zikruti, and Arakuttu is hardly doubtful. Nisaa must denote the region or district of Nisæa in the east of Media. Zikruti,[11 - Ménant translates, "city of Zikruti;" G. Smith's rendering does not give this description in this passage (p. 260), but on p. 271.] which is mentioned together with Nisæa, may be the name of the Sagartians of Herodotus, the Açagarta of the inscriptions of the Achæmenids, a race mentioned by Herodotus among the tribes of the Persians; they were settled or wandered to the east of the latter. Arakuttu gives us the Semitic form of the name of the Harauvati of the Persian inscriptions, the Haravaïti of the Avesta, the Arachoti of the Greeks. The Arachoti were settled in the river-valley of the Arachotus (now Arghandab), which falls into lake Hamun, to the east of the river. But Tiglath Pilesar did not maintain his supremacy on the table-land of Iran to this extent. In the enumeration of the conquered districts of the second campaign the names Nisaa and Arakuttu are wanting, while Zikruti, Parsua, and Madai (Media), and the tribute of Media, which must therefore have been obtained by a new campaign of the general of Tiglath Pilesar, are brought into prominence. The second campaign of the king was therefore limited to the western regions of Iran. At a later time, in the ninth year of his reign (737 B.C.), he once more marched into the land of Media.[12 - G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 279; Ménant, loc. cit. p. 146.] A second inscription says, in summary, that Tiglath Pilesar imposed tribute on the "land of Parsua" and the "city of Zikruti," which was dependent on the land of the Medes, and on the princes of the land of Media as far as the land of Bikni.[13 - L. 17 in Ménant, loc. cit. p. 139.]

When Tiglath Pilesar ascended the throne Nabonassar (747-734 B.C.) had been king of Babylon for two years, according to the canon of Ptolemy. Babylonia no longer possessed the extent of country once given to her by Hammurabi, and which we may ascribe to her during the numerous wars carried on with Assyria from the middle of the fifteenth century, and even at the date of Shalmanesar II. and Bin-nirar III. Either through the preponderance which Assyria had obtained over Babylon after the middle of the ninth century, or from other causes, we find several independent principalities on the lower course of the Euphrates after the middle of the eighth century; the Assyrian inscriptions mention as such, Bit Sahalla, Bit Silan, Bit Dakkur, Bit Amukan, and Bit Yakin at the mouth of the Euphrates, on the shore of the Persian Gulf. So far as we can discover from the monuments, Tiglath Pilesar was at war with Babylonia in the very first year of his reign.[14 - Above, p. 2, note 4.] Dur Kurigalzu, the old border fortress of Babylon against Assyria, Sippara, and other cities of the land of Kardunias on the river or canal Ukni, are mentioned, and the priests of Bit Saggatu or Bit Zida, i. e. of the chief temples of Babylon and Borsippa, together with the priest of Nergal, who bring gifts to Tiglath Pilesar; we hear of 10 talents of gold, and 1000 talents of silver, received by Tiglath Pilesar in the first year of his reign.[15 - Frag. 1, 2 in G. Smith, "Disc." pp. 266, 267.] In the summary of his achievements (on the tablet of Chalah) the king says that he has taken Dur Kurigalzu, that he has offered sacrifice at Sippara, Nipur, Babylon, Borsippa, Kutha, and Ur, that in the beginning of his reign he ruled from Dur Kurigalzu to Nipur.[16 - Ménant, loc. cit. p. 139.] The king of Babylon, against whom he fought and whom he compelled to open the gates of his fortresses and of Babylon, is not mentioned by Tiglath Pilesar. We must assume, from the canon of Ptolemy, that it was Nabonassar who bowed himself before the weight of the arms of Assyria. Yet the obedience of Babylon was not secured. Fragments of the detailed annals of Tiglath Pilesar inform us that his general again fought against the Babylonians, that he himself again conquered a city which the Babylonians had taken, that in the region of Tel Assur he sacrificed to Merodach the god of Tel Assur.[17 - The list of rulers inserts a second campaign of Tiglath Pilesar to the land of the stream in the year 737 B.C.; frag. 8, 11. 18, 19, 52-55 in G. Smith, loc. cit. pp. 277, 280, 281.] An inscription of Chalah narrates that Tiglath Pilesar laid waste Bit Amukan and Bit Sahalla, and took their kings Nabu-sabzi and Zakiru prisoners; that he besieged king Kinziru in Sapiya (Sape), his capital, and added to Assyria Pillutu on the border of Assyria and Elam; that he received the tributes of the kings of the Chaldæans, of Balasu, the son of Dakkuri, of Nadin of Larrak, and Merodach Baladan, the son of Yakin, the king of the sea coast.[18 - Ll. 12-19 in G. Smith, "Disc." pp. 255, 256.] The large tablet tells us more at length. "Pillutu on the borders of Elam I added to Assyria; the Chaldæans I removed from thence and placed in the midst of Assyria. The warriors of Nabu-sabzi, the son of Silani, I defeated under the walls of his city of Sarrapani, and I crucified him before the great gate of his city. Five thousand five hundred of his people I took captive; his sons, his daughters, his gods I carried away: his city and the cities round about it I destroyed and burnt. Zakiru, the son of Sahalli, and his chieftains I captured; I put them in irons and brought them to Assyria; 5400 of the people of Bit Sahalla I captured; I laid waste all the districts of Bit Sahalla and united them to Assyria. The numerous army of Kinziru, the son of Amukan, I defeated before the great gate of his city, Sapiya; I besieged him and overthrew all his cities. Bit Silan, Bit Amukan, Bit Sahalla, I have laid waste throughout their whole extent; I received the tribute of Balasu, the son of Dakkuri, and of Nadin of Larrak; Merodach Baladan, the son of Yakin, the king of the sea-coast, was overcome by the fear of Asshur, my lord: he came to Sapiya and kissed my feet, and I received his tribute."[19 - Ll. 14-28 in G. Smith, "Disc." pp. 258-260.]

The canon of Ptolemy represents Nadius as succeeding Nabonassar of Babylon in the year 733 B.C. Is the Nabu-sabzi of Bit Silan whom Tiglath Pilesar defeats near the city of Sarrapani the king Nadius of the canon; and ought his name to be altered in the canon to Nabius? According to the canon Nadius reigned only two years (733, 732 B.C.); the campaign of Tiglath Pilesar, which ended in the conquest and execution of Nabu-sabzi, must therefore have taken place in the year 732 B.C. After the conquest of Nabu-sabzi, as the inscriptions told us, Tiglath Pilesar subjugates Kinziru of Bit Amukan, when he had besieged Sapiya, his capital; in this city he receives the homage of Merodach Baladan. The list of rulers places the campaign against Sapiya in the year 731 B.C. In the canon of Ptolemy, Nadius is succeeded by a joint rule: from the year 731 to 727 B.C. Chinzirus and Porus reign over Babylon. Is the Kinziru of Bit Amukan the Chinzirus of the canon?

After the subjugation of Merodach Baladan, king of the sea-coast, i. e. the coast of the Persian Gulf, Tiglath Pilesar's dominion extended over the whole region of the Euphrates. He assures us that "he laid waste the land of Chaldæa throughout its whole extent," and "received tribute from all the Chaldæans;" that "he possessed the whole land of Kardunias (Babylonia), and was lord over it;"[20 - G. Smith, loc. cit. pp. 255, 258.] and with perfect truth, for an inscription of king Sargon tells us, that Bit Amukan, Bit Dakkur, Bit Silan, Bit Sahalla, Bit Yakin form the whole of the land of the Chaldæans.[21 - Oppert, "Dur Sarkayan," p. 20; Ménant, "Annal." pp. 160, 181.] Tiglath Pilesar calls himself "king of Asshur, king of Babylon, king of Sumir and Accad;" he claims the full title of the kings of Babylon. The names of the principalities of Chaldæa are obviously taken from their dynasties. Nabu-sabzi is called the son of Silan, and his land Bit Silan; Merodach Baladan is the son of Yakin, and his land is Bit Yakin. Shalmanesar II., as we saw (Vol. II. p. 239), spoke of Israel as Bit Omri, i. e. the house of Omri. The Chinzirus of the canon of Ptolemy enables us to assume that Tiglath Pilesar after the defeat of Kinziru of Bit Amukan placed this Kinziru as a vassal-king or viceroy over Babylon, a proceeding which recurs often enough in the proceedings of the kings of Asshur towards conquered principalities and lands.

The canon of Ptolemy does not make Chinzirus the sole king of Babylon. From 731 B.C. to 727 B.C. Chinzirus and Porus are said to have reigned together – a joint sovereignty, of which this is the only instance in the canon. Strikingly enough their two reigns end in the same year, and this, 727 B.C. is the very year in which, according to the Assyrian canon, Tiglath Pilesar's reign is brought to a close. In the excerpt from Berosus' list of the kings of Babylon, given by Polyhistor, of which Eusebius has preserved some very scanty fragments, the 45 kings who reigned over Babylon for 526 years are followed by "a king of the Chaldæans, whose name was Phul."[22 - Vol. II. p. 27; Euseb., "Chron." 1, p. 26, ed. Schöne.] If the Babylonians named Tiglath Pilesar Phul in their list of kings, and if Porus in the canon of Ptolemy is a mistake for Polus (Pul), the Babylonians, in order to conceal their dependence on Assyria, must have placed their countryman before the stranger, the vassal king before the real king in their series of rulers.

The Hebrew Scriptures tell us that Phul of Asshur marched against Israel; Menahem of Israel paid Phul a tribute of 1000 talents of silver, and the king of Assyria returned into his land. Then Ahaz of Judah sent messengers to king Tiglath Pilesar of Asshur to save him out of the hand of Rezin, king of Damascus, and Pekah, king of Israel. Pekah had put to death Pekahiah, the son of Menahem, after a reign of two years, and seated himself on the throne. Tiglath Pilesar listened to Ahaz and came and carried away a part of the Israelites to Assyria, and Hoshea set on foot a conspiracy and slew Pekah and became king in his place.[23 - 2 Kings xv. 19, 29; xvi. 7-9; 1 Chron. v. 26.] The inscriptions of Tiglath Pilesar mention among the princes who brought him tribute "Minihimmi (Menahem) of Samirina (Samaria),"[24 - G. Smith, "Disc." p. 277.] and also "Jauhazi (Ahaz) of Judah;"[25 - G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 263.] a fragment informs us that Tiglath Pilesar reached the borders of Bit Omri, i. e. of Israel (Vol. II. p. 239). "Pakaha (Pekah) their king they had slain;" so Tiglath Pilesar continues in this fragment, "I put Husi (Hoshea) to be king over them."[26 - G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 284.] The inscription also speaks, in this place, of sending or carrying away to Assyria, but it is in such a mutilated condition that more accurate knowledge is impossible. Still it is abundantly clear from this fragment that the king of Assyria, who received tribute from Menahem of Israel and then marched against Israel when Pekah had ascended the throne, was one and the same prince, Tiglath Pilesar. We might assume a double payment of tribute on the part of Menahem, a payment to Phul and a second payment to Tiglath Pilesar, but this is met by the fact that the monuments of Assyria know no king of the name of Phul, and the continuity of the lists of Assyrian Eponyms does not allow us to insert a king of the name of Phul between Tiglath Pilesar and his predecessor Assur-nirar II. The error of the Book of Kings in ascribing the first campaign against Menahem of Israel to Phul, and the second, in support of Ahaz against Pekah of Israel, to Tiglath Pilesar, is most easily explained, if we admit the hypothesis given above,[27 - It is due to E. Schrader.] that the Babylonians gave the name Phul to Tiglath Pilesar as their supreme king.

Tiglath Pilesar held the western regions of the table-land of Iran in dependence. He ruled as king over Babylonia, over the whole region of the Euphrates down to the borders of Elam and the shore of the Persian Gulf; and in the North also he led the armies of Assyria to victorious campaigns. His tablets tell us that he incorporated with Assyria the land of Nairi, i. e. the region between the upper Zab and the upper Tigris, that he defeated king Sarduarri of Ararat (Urarti), who had rebelled against him, took his camp and besieged him in his city of Turuspa; that he set up "an image of his majesty" there, and laid waste the land of Ararat far and wide.[28 - Frag. 4, ll. 12-23 in G. Smith, "Disc." pp. 271, 272.] Afterwards Sarduarri and Sulumal of Milid (Melitene) and Kustaspi of Kummukh (Gumathene), each trusting to the power of the other, rebelled; these he defeated, and took captives to the number of 72,950 men. In the middle of the battle Sarduarri rode away: he (Tiglath Pilesar) took the seal from his neck, his neck-band, his royal chariot, and his couch, and dedicated them to Istar of Nineveh.[29 - Frag. 5 in G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 272, 273.] The inscriptions further inform us that Kustaspi of Kummukh, Sulumal of Milid, and Vassurmi of Tubal gave tribute to Tiglath Pilesar, and when Vassurmi was negligent in the service of Assyria and did not appear before his face, Tiglath Pilesar sent his chief captain against him and set up Chulli to be king of Tubal in Vassurmi's place.[30 - The large inscription, lines 57-59, 64, 65 in G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 263.] The list of rulers puts the first war of Tiglath Pilesar in the year 743 B.C., the second campaign against Ararat and the princes leagued with him in the year 735 B.C.

Of the successes of Tiglath Pilesar in Syria we shall hear below. When he received the tribute of Hamath, Byblus, and Israel before the ninth year of his reign, i. e. in the year 738 B.C., Zabibieh, the queen of the Arabs, also paid tribute.[31 - Frag. 8, l. 33 in G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 279.] When he had overthrown Damascus, Israel, and the Philistines (732 B.C.), he fought against Samsieh, the queen of the Arabians, in the region of Saba,[32 - Frag. 13, l. 3; cf. frag. 10, l. 16; frag. 12, l. 19 in G. Smith, pp. 283, 285, 286.] as we are told in a fragment of his annals, and took from her 30,000 camels, and 20,000 oxen. In the inscriptions which sum up the achievements of the king we are told that he subjugated the Nabatu (who must be sought to the south on the lower Euphrates), the Hagaranu (the Hagarites), the Pekudu (Pekod);[33 - Tablet of Chalah, l. 6 in G. Smith, p. 254; stone of Chalah, ll. 6, 8, 13, p. 254.] that the distant tribes of Tema (the Temanites) and Saba (the Sabæans), on the borders of the setting sun, heard of his power, and submitted to him, brought gold, silver, and camels, and kissed his feet.[34 - Stone of Chalah, ll. 53-55 in G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 262.] A fragment of the annals repeats this statement; on the borders of the land of the setting sun they heard of his power and his victories and submitted to him.[35 - Frag. 13, loc. cit. p. 286.] Hence it was not only migratory tribes in the neighbourhood of Syria and the lower Euphrates, like the Pekod and Hagarites, whom Tiglath Pilesar forced to recognise his supremacy and pay tribute: his armies must have advanced from Syria and the lower Euphrates to the interior of Arabia, if the Temanites (I. 324) and the tribes of the South, "on the borders of the setting sun," i. e. the tribes of the South-west, the Sabæans, in "fear of his power and his victories," sent him tribute.

If the armies of Assyria reached no further than Deraeah in the interior of Arabia, it was still a vast stretch of country which they traversed in the eighteen years in which Tiglath Pilesar sat on the throne. Yet they also reached Lake Hamun and the land of the Arachoti in the East on the further side of the Persian Gulf. On the terrace of Chalah which supported the royal citadels Tiglath Pilesar built himself a palace to the south of the house of Shalmanesar II. It is the central palace of the explorers. The great inscription on one of the marble slabs found in the floor in the ruins tells us that he built his royal abode in the midst of Chalah for his glory; that he placed it higher above the bed of the Tigris than the palaces of his predecessors; that he adorned it with costly decorations, and placed in it the tributes of the kings of the Chatti, the princes of the Aramæans and Chaldæans, who had bowed their might at his feet[36 - Ll. 67-86 in G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 264, 265.] The inscription begins with the words, "Palace of Tiglath Pilesar the great king, the mighty king, the king of the nations, the king of Assyria, the high priest of Babylon, the king of Sumir and Accad, the king of the four quarters of the earth, the mighty warrior, who in the service of Asshur his lord has marched through the lands, swept over them like a storm, treated them as captives; the king, who, under the protection of Asshur, Samas, Merodach, the great gods, his lords, ruled from the sea of Bit Yakin as far as Bikni, and from the sea of the setting sun (i. e. the Mediterranean) as far as Muzur (Egypt)."[37 - G. Smith, "Disc." ll. 1-4, p. 256, 257.] The second shorter inscription says in a similar manner: "Palace of Tiglath Pilesar the great king, the mighty king, the king of the nations, the king of Assyria, the king of Babylon, the king of Sumir and Accad, the king of the four quarters of the earth, the mighty warrior, who in the service of Asshur, his lord, has trodden to pieces like clay all who hated him, has washed them away like a flood and made them into shadows – the king who marched out under the protection of Nebo and Merodach, the great gods, and reigned from the sea of Bit Yakin to the land of Bikni, to the rising sun, and from the sea of the setting sun to Muzur, who possessed all lands from the setting to the rising and ruled over their kingdoms."[38 - G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 254.] Of this proud palace but scanty ruins remain. One of the successors of Tiglath Pilesar, who ascended the throne of Assyria 46 years after him, caused the slabs on which Tiglath Pilesar had depicted his campaigns and victories together with the explanatory inscriptions above them, to be taken away, in order to have them smoothed, and placed when filled with pictures of his own achievements in the house which he built in the south-west corner of the terrace of Chalah. This successor died during the building of his house. This is clear from the fact that slabs and inscriptions of the palace of Tiglath Pilesar, intended for the new structure, have been found partly in the remains of the old building and partly in the new structure, with the defacement partially carried out.[39 - The three private documents on the sale of a slave, the loan on the mortgage of a field, and the interest and security for an advance, which are placed in the time of Tiglath Pilesar III., are given in Oppert et Ménant, "Docum. Juridiq." p. 153 sqq.]

CHAPTER II.

THE PROPHETS OF ISRAEL

The overthrow of the house of Omri had not raised the power of the kingdom of Israel. Jehu, it is true, sent tribute to Shalmanesar II. king of Assyria (842 B.C.). But in spite of this subjection to the great king on the Tigris, neither Jehu nor his son Jehoahaz was in a position to repel the attacks of the princes of Damascus, Hazael and Benhadad III.; the whole region to the East of the Jordan, the land of Gilead, had to be conceded to Damascus after the most cruel devastation of that district and of all Israel. It was the distress into which Bin-nirar III. of Asshur brought Damascus which first afforded respite to Israel in the last years of Jehoahaz, though tribute for this service also had to be paid to Assyria (803 B.C.). His successor, king Joash (798-790 B.C.) was now able to wrest from Damascus at least those cities which his father had lost, and the son of Joash, Jeroboam II. (790-749 B.C.), the fourth sovereign of the house of Jehu, succeeded in gaining the upper hand over Damascus, in completely reconquering the land of Gilead, and inflicting heavy blows on Hamath. The land which he conquered from Hamath he retained; the Books of Kings mention the brave deeds of Jeroboam II., how "he set up again the borders of Israel, from the land of Hamath to the sea of the plain." During his long and powerful reign – he sat on the throne for 41 years[40 - 2 Kings xiv. 23; Amos vi. 2, 14.]– agriculture was developed, trade became again active, and, as it seems, very lucrative. In Samaria, the metropolis, there were splendid houses, the inhabitants of which lived in magnificence and luxury.[41 - Amos iii. 11; vi. 4-8; Hosea xii. 9. That the commencement of Jehu and Athaliah must be placed at the year 843 B.C., has been shown Vol. II. p. 234. The Books of Kings give 165 years from the accession of Athaliah to the fall of Samaria, and 143 years from the accession of Jehu to the same time. Hence the synchronism which they observe for corresponding reigns in Israel and Judah cannot be correct at any rate for the last half-century of this time, and varying statements with reference to these reigns show that this fact was known to those who made these observations. Moreover, the canon of the Assyrians puts the fall of Samaria in the year 722 B.C., from which it follows (843-722=121), that 44 years in excess for Judah, and 22 for Israel, have been added. Thus we are driven to hypotheses for the period from 843 to 722 B.C., as well as for the period 953-843. In the traditional numbers at least in one reign there has been abbreviation, not extension, as in the previous period. Samaria was taken in the ninth year of Hoshea, the seventh of Hezekiah (2 Kings xvii. 6; xviii. 10). Hoshea therefore ascended the throne in 730, Hezekiah in 728 B.C. But the facts narrated in a fragment of the annals of Tiglath Pilesar, that he reached the borders of Bit Omri, that he conquered Gaza and made Hoshea king (frag. 11, in G. Smith, "Disc." p. 284), fall, according to the list of rulers, in the year 734 B.C. Hoshea's accession must, therefore, be placed in the year 734 B.C. Hoshea's predecessor, Pekah, is said to have reigned 20 years. If Hoshea ascended the throne in 734 B.C., Pekah, according to this statement, must have ascended it in 754 B.C., and Pekahiah, the son of Menahem, who only reigned two years, in 756. But the fragment of the annals of Tiglath Pilesar, which mentions the payment of tribute by Menahem, puts this payment immediately before the ninth year of Tiglath Pilesar, i. e. before the year 737 B.C.,; frag. 8, in G. Smith, loc. cit. In 738, therefore, Menahem was still on the throne; and his death cannot have taken place before this year. Thus the interval between Menahem's death and Hoshea's accession, which the Books of Kings reckon at 22 years, is reduced to four years; Pekah cannot have reigned 20, but only two or three years. Menahem's death in 738 B.C., fixes the beginning of his reign, which lasted 10 years, at 748 B.C. Before him, Zachariah, the son of Jeroboam, and Shallum, reigned seven months. Jeroboam's reign must, therefore, have ended in 749 B.C. It lasted 41 years, and must, therefore, have begun in 790 B.C. Thus of the 82 years and seven months, which the Books of Kings reckon for Israel from the accession of Jeroboam to the capture of Samaria, 68 only remain. We must place Jeroboam from 790 to 749, Zachariah and Shallum in 749, Menahem's accession in 748, his death in 738; Pekahiah from 738 to 736, Pekah from 736 to 734, in which year he is succeeded by Hoshea.In the list of the kings of Judah, 90 years are enumerated from Uzziah's (Azariah's) accession to the fall of Samaria. Before Hezekiah, whose accession as already observed is to be put in 728 B.C., comes Ahaz with 16 years; before Ahaz, Jotham also with 16 years. Hence Jotham's predecessor, Uzziah-Azariah, died in 760, and Ahaz began to reign in 744. But the eighth fragment of the annals of Tiglath Pilesar, already mentioned, puts the defection of the 19 districts of the land of Hamath to Azariah not long before the year 738 B.C.,; other fragments mention contacts with Azariah, which, according to the list of rulers, belong to the years 742 or 740 B.C. Hence Azariah was alive at any rate as late as 740 B.C.; the interval given by the Books of Kings between Uzziah-Azariah and the accession of Hezekiah is reduced from 32 to 12 years. The reigns of Jotham and Ahaz must therefore be reduced from 16 years each to six years each; and the 90 years from Uzziah's accession to the fall of Samaria to 70 years. The parallelism with the reigns in Israel remains undisturbed. Jotham reigned from 740 to 734, Ahaz from 734 to 728. In the year 734 Ahaz is attacked by Pekah, who, as we have seen, reigned from 736 to 734, and before the accession of Ahaz had attacked his predecessor Jotham (2 Kings xv. 37). The campaign of Tiglath Pilesar against Pekah took place, according to the list of the rulers, in the year 734 B.C. The same list puts the war of Tiglath Pilesar against Damascus in the years 733 and 732 B.C. The great inscription of Tiglath Pilesar which narrates his deeds down to the seventeenth year of his reign, i. e. down to 729 B.C., mentions shortly before the close the tribute of Jauhazi of Judah (in G. Smith, loc. cit. p. 263), and the Books of Kings (II. xvi. 10, 18), mention the journey of Ahaz to Damascus to pay homage there to Tiglath Pilesar. This must, therefore, have taken place in 732 B.C.. The synchronism of Jeroboam and Uzziah, which is also always marked at the commencement of the prophetic writings referring to them, is not altered by our assumptions. Uzziah, who ascended the throne at 16 years of age, reigned from 792 to 740; Jeroboam from 790 to 749. From Uzziah's accession up to the accession of Athaliah, the Books of Kings give 75 years; the interval between 843 and 792 gives us 51 years; so that there must have been an abbreviation. This can be assumed most conveniently in the reign of Amaziah, which lasted for 29 years, and includes the years from 797 to 792. In the reign of his father Joash we know that there was a long minority, and the twenty-third year of this reign is mentioned. Of Amaziah's acts, the subjugation of Edom, which he did not complete, comes after the year 803 B.C. Edom's tribute is mentioned under Bin-nirar of Assyria (II. 326). Just as little is the parallelism of Amaziah with Joash of Israel altered by our assumption. As 61 years, i. e. eight years too many, were given for Israel from the accession of Jeroboam (790) up to Jehu's accession, eight years must be taken from the reign of Joash, and for his reign, therefore, eight years are left instead of 16, i. e. the eight years from 798 to 790. Violent as these assumptions seem as compared with the traditional numbers of the Books of Kings, they are merely given as a forced hypothesis, and at any rate leave the traditional facts undisturbed, while the coincidence, which may be obtained by assuming joint regencies, a first and second reign of Jeroboam II., a first and second Menahem, a first and second reign of Pekah, for the lists of Judah and Israel, alters the tradition without bringing the agreement into harmony with the list of eponyms.]

In Judah the reign of Joash, whom the high-priest Jehoiada placed on the throne in the year 837 B.C., again fully established the worship of Jehovah in opposition to the favour which his grandmother Athaliah had shown to the worship of Baal. Amaziah, the son of Joash, maintained his throne against the murderers of his father; his arms were successful against the Edomites, but failed against Israel. When he also was slain by conspirators, the people, in the year 792 B.C., raised his son Uzziah (Azariah) to the throne. Uzziah was only 16 years of age at the time of his accession, but young as he was he learned well how to rule, and the length of his reign allowed him to see the fruit of his labours. The Chronicles say of him: "He loved husbandry; he had husbandmen and vinedressers in the mountains, and dug many wells in the desert, for he had many cattle in the low country and in the plain."[42 - 2 Chron. xxvi. 10.] Uzziah was also a brave warrior. Against the Philistines he obtained greater successes than fell to the lot of any of his predecessors, including even Saul and David, greater than those won by any of his successors. He took Gath, the prince of which David had once served; he gained Jabneh and conquered Ashdod, and destroyed the walls of this city. The loss of Gath and Ashdod limited the league of the cities of the Philistines to Ekron, Ascalon, and Gaza; Uzziah built Jewish cities in the conquered districts,[43 - 2 Chron. xxvi. 6; Zech. ix. 6. As Amos mentions the capture of Gath (vi. 2), and Judah is still to conquer the remnant of Edom (Amos ix. 12), the war against the Philistines must be regarded as one of Uzziah's deeds in arms.] he forced the Ammonites to pay tribute, he completed the subjugation of the Edomites which his father Amaziah had begun, and his fame reached even to Egypt.[44 - 2 Chron. xxvi. 7; Isa. ii. 7.] He rebuilt the harbour-city of Elath on the Red Sea, which the rebellion of the Edomites against Judah had wrested from king Jehoram about the year 845 B.C. (II. 252), placed Jews there, and apparently restored the Ophir trade of Solomon.[45 - 2 Kings xiv. 22. The re-conquest of the Judæan settlement and harbour city, which had been destroyed by the Edomites in their revolt from Judah under Jehoram (II. 252), can have had no other object than to restore the trade connections on the Red Sea. Besides, it is expressly stated (2 Kings xvi. 6): "At the same time (734 B.C.), Rezin again gained Elath for Syria, and drove the Jews out of Elath, and the Syrians came to Elath, and dwelt there to this day."] "He was marvellously helped," say the Chronicles, "till he became strong." Amid such successes Uzziah did not forget that changes would occur, that other times would come. In the second half of his reign[46 - This follows from the fact that Amos speaks of the ruined tabernacle of David, and the breaches in its wall (ix. 11).] he strengthened the walls of Jerusalem with towers at the corner-gate, i. e. at the north-west corner, of the city wall, at the valley gate, and at the corner, i. e. where the wall of the upper city advances to the west, and caused "engines invented by cunning men to be on the towers and upon the bulwarks of the walls, to throw arrows and great stones withal."[47 - 2 Chron. xxvi. 15.] The levy of the people was put in order; the fighting men were entered on a register; Uzziah "prepared for the whole army shields and spears, coats of mail and helmets, bows and slinging stones."[48 - 2 Chron. xxvi. 11-14.] "And Uzziah did what was right in the eyes of Jehovah as Amaziah his father had done, save that the people still sacrificed and offered incense on the high places" – so we are told in the Books of Kings. The Chronicles add that he sought God as long as the prophet Zachariah lived.[49 - An older prophet of this name, distinct from the son of Jehoiadah, and perhaps also distinct from the son of Berechiah (Isa. viii. 2), but identical with this Zachariah, if the words of the Chronicles may be explained to mean: "So long as he (Uzziah) listened to Zachariah."] Afterwards he had a quarrel with the priests of the temple because he sacrificed with his own hands in the great space of the temple, the holy place (before the Holy of Holies), on the altar in that space intended for incense. David and Solomon had offered incense there before him; the priesthood intended therefore to make good their exclusive claim to every kind of sacrifice as against Uzziah.[50 - 2 Kings xv. 3; 2 Chron. xxvi 6-21; 1 Kings ix. 25.] Uzziah succeeded in raising Judah to the highest point of power and importance, which it reached after the defection of Israel.

Thus after severe tempests the reigns of Jeroboam II. and Uzziah brought to Israel and Judah the restoration of order, power and prosperity. The flourishing condition of agriculture and trade increased the well-being of the people, and produced profits which led the wealthy classes into a misuse of their wealth, into extravagance and luxury. This mode of life, which seldom, in the East especially, fails to accompany gains easily got, was attacked in both kingdoms by a merciless criticism. In Israel and in Judah a careless enjoyment of life was connected not unfrequently with a certain inclination towards the rites of the Syrians. From the time that the house of Jehu ruled in Israel, and Joash ascended the throne of Judah, the favourable feeling towards Syrian rites had ceased, from the throne downwards. With the restoration of more active relations towards the neighbouring nations their example operated with renewed force on the wealthier classes of Israel, and among them, and afterwards no doubt among the people, admission and recognition was thus gained for the religious observances of the Syrians. As the sensual elements in the forms of the gods and the cultus of the Syrians became more marked – as the worship of the deities of procreation and birth became more licentious and debauched, in connection with the increased population, and consequent luxury and dissoluteness in the Phenician cities (II. 276), as the prostitution became more general, the service of androgynous deities more zealous – as the number of sacred servants, of companions male and female, of eunuchs and men ready to make themselves eunuchs, became larger – as this worship of lust and mutilation grew more disgusting, and the flames on the altar of Moloch rose more frequently – so much the more vigorous, in the circles of the neighbouring nations, whose national and religious life was roused, must have been the aversion and opposition to such licentious practices, to rites of so different a nature, and so strongly at variance with their own faith.

Three centuries before this time, Israel by the foundation of a monarchy had gained rest and security against her nearest neighbours in the East and West, against Moab and Ammon, and the Philistines. After the division the powers of Israel and Judah had hardly sufficed at all times to protect them against their neighbours; and even, at last, against the Damascenes. Serious dangers threatened from a greater distance. Egypt, the country from which in Syria there was naturally the most to fear, had kept within her borders since the settlement of the Israelites in Canaan, as if to secure space and freedom for the development of Israel. Only once in the course of five centuries was this rest broken by the campaign of the Pharaoh Shishak, and then in a very transitory manner. But half a century after this campaign another opponent arose far to the East on the banks of the Tigris, who now had secured a firm footing on the Euphrates, whose armies first trod the north of Syria, and tried their strength in repeated campaigns against Damascus. Ahab of Israel in league with Damascus and other princes of the Syrians succeeded in beating off the first attack; but after him Jehu and Jehoahaz of Israel paid tribute to the kings of Asshur, and though the successors of Bin-nirar III. had to fight in Arrapachitis and Gauzanitis, they repeatedly led their armies against Northern Syria, against Arpad and Hadrach.

However secure men might feel in Israel and Judah in the possession of the position recently obtained under Jeroboam and Uzziah, it could not escape a keener eye that a power had forced its way to the Euphrates, and every moment threatened a renewed attack on Syria which Israel and Judah were not in a position to resist, even in the favourable position in which for a moment they were situated. Even if Israel and Judah united their forces, which for the moment were excellently arranged, it was scarcely conceivable that they could make any stand against the supremacy of Assyria, if this were expressly directed against Syria. Only in the event of a hearty combination of all the states and tribes of Syria, the Philistines and the Phenicians, Hamath and Damascus, Israel and Judah; only by the union of all Syria under one power, could a sufficient counterpoise be provided to the Assyrian power. But the feeling and tendencies of these states were different, as also was the state of civilisation and religious life; and the thought of such an union never arose among them. Even if it had it could hardly be realised here, or elsewhere in the East, in any other way than by establishing one despotic monarch. Such a form of union would at any rate have required that Israel should give the best she had. Instead of a political impulse which would have united Israel and Judah with Damascus and Hamath, the Phenicians and Philistines, the internal circumstances of Israel and Judah, the opposition to the renewed encroachments of the Canaanitish worship, combined with the threatening position of Assyria, gave a new, peculiar, and lofty flight to the religious development of the Israelites.

In its struggles against the house of Omri the prophetic power was inwardly ripened and strengthened. With the relaxation of persecution the intensity and ecstacy of the prophets must have been relaxed. In the place of the passionate strife came a more peaceful tone, greater calmness, more earnest introspection. Yet the prophetic power was not merely purified, it was also deepened. By degrees, elements which had been developed in other spheres exercised an influence on the prophetic work, on the reflection on the nature and will of Jehovah, and the effort to be absorbed in him. The expression and outlet which religious feeling had found in religious songs, in invocations, and hymns of thanksgiving, praise and penitence, supplied to the prophetic feeling a fuller, broader and more variable background. To the oldest account of the fortunes of Israel, which arose in priestly circles, and of the covenant which his God had once made with him, to the collection and establishment of the law which formed the contents of this covenant, was soon added the second text, which described in a more lively manner the manifestations of the tribal God, his guidance of the patriarchs and forefathers of the nation, and, like the older text, it was for a long time in the hands of the prophets. Even before Joel, at the time when the high-priest Jehoiada was regent for king Joash in Judah (II. 259), urged the nation to repentance and introspection, the hand of a prophet had united those two texts. Penetrated by their contents, he had, as might be expected from his point of view, laid the main stress on the promises and prophecies, on the relation of man to God, on the nature of man, and his duty in life. In this form the books of the fortunes of the patriarchs, of the covenant of Jehovah and Israel, of the promise of protection and blessing in return for the observation of this covenant, must have exercised an especial influence on the circle of the prophets; they showed them the past in the closest relation to the present; they strengthened their conviction that the external relation was insufficient, that the essential point was the internal relation of man to his God.

As a fact the people of Israel had experienced a peculiar fortune. Of the same origin as a part of the Arabian and Syrian tribes and closely allied to them, the Israelites had not followed the same path of development. Branching off from those nearest, and then from their older tribesmen, with whom they had previously pastured their flocks, they grew up into a nation on the borders of Egypt and under Egyptian supremacy; a nation in which nomadic simplicity met with certain influences due to Egyptian culture. Forced back upon their feeling of national independence by the oppression of the Egyptians, the children of Jacob had emancipated themselves from Egyptian dominion, and had embraced with renewed vigour the worship of their tribal God, and at length had won by force of arms an abode among the kindred tribes, to which they now stood opposed as enemies. The tribes of Syria were far before them in culture of every kind, in wealth and adornment of life; the tribes of the desert, the closely related neighbours on the east of the Jordan, did not cease to attack and plunder the cantons of the Israelites; their neighbours on the south coast sought with persistence to subjugate them. Thus the national contrast remained in force, and the fixity of it was favoured by the nature of the mountain country, the seclusion of many valleys and heights possessed by the Israelites, while these same natural conditions rendered impossible such a thorough entrance into the life of the maritime cities, and the life of Damascus and Hamath, as could lead to the dissolution of the nationality. The fact that Israel, at the time of David and Solomon, obtained the preponderance over their neighbours, tended, together with the national pride, to strengthen the contrast instead of weakening it, and maintained the consciousness of nationality as a great memory. Even from this point of view, starting from the national feeling and consciousness, the prophets could not but oppose the Syrian tribes and their rites, and in this opposition they found the more ready acceptance in Israel, the more thoroughly the consciousness was aroused that the land had been won and maintained in conflict with the tribes to whom this worship belonged. But the conception of the nature of the national deity was far more powerful in the prophets than the sense of nationality. In contrast to the lascivious worship of the powers of nature, the God of Israel was originally conceived as a deity who was alien and opposed to the creative powers of nature. In the sense of this contrast Jehovah was regarded as an exalted and terrible deity, to look on whom brought death; in this feeling the simple conception, which cannot forego the sensuous element, saw Jehovah's manifestation in flame, in the destroying but purifying glow of fire. The aversion to all sensuous nature now rises to its fullest power in the mind of the prophets in opposition to the Syrian rites; their supernatural point of view, forced onward by the struggle and the contrast, disrobed the idea of God of every material element which still adhered to it. How could this supra-terrestrial power, before which all that is earthly is dust and mire, dwell in a frail image made by human hands? The temple at Jerusalem had no image, the greater part of the old places of sacrifice were without any, and among the Hebrews it was well known that the worship of Jehovah without images was the traditional mode of worship. Neither the bull-images of Jehovah, which had been set up at the time of the division of the kingdom in Israel, in contrast to the images of the Syrian gods, though tolerated by the prophets at the time of Ahab and Jehoram, nor any other image of the god, ought to be worshipped. If the divine power is not only supernatural but also purely spiritual, beyond nature and ruling over it; if it is without manifestation in the world of sense; there can be no question of the worship or deification of elementary powers, or the personification of physical processes; the worship of these is nothing but deception and senseless rites. Moreover, the power before which all nature quakes can be but one. Thus, to the prophetic mind, Jehovah from being the tribal God of Israel, beside whom other gods defended their nations, though not so mighty as he, becomes the one and only God. And to them this God is no longer merely the power which rules over nature, no longer merely the jealous and severe God of his nation from whom the first-born must be purchased, who must be worshipped with many sacrifices, and pleasant odours – to the inward emotion, the inward certainty, and conscience of the prophets he is at the same time the highest ethical power. Whatever they in their enlightenment and in their hearts felt to be the just, the good, the highest, is Jehovah's nature. In him were concentrated the moral elements as conceived by the prophets, and nature is no more than the footstool under his feet. He is now the one supernatural, spiritual and moral power, which rules the world, before which earth and mankind disappear. He is pure, holy and sublime; he hates injustice, violence, exaction, avarice, deceit, and oppression of kindred, and looks not on wickedness with favour. His will is just, he will requite every one according to his actions, and will not forget the evil of the evil-doer. What can the holy and just Lord in heaven care for offerings of food, frankincense, and drink? The lips and the heart must be elevated to his greatness, his commands must be kept, and men must make themselves holy as he is holy. The only service of the holy God is a holy and righteous life. Sacrifice is not required, but recognition of God, simplicity, chastity, and moderation.

If from this point of view, to which their own conception had laboriously risen – they had learned to know the ancient God of Israel in his true nature – and following the lead of the sacred Scriptures, the prophets cast a glance on the fortunes and achievements of their nation, – had not Jehovah already announced himself to their forefathers? Had he not by Moses commanded and established the true worship? Had he not done great things for his people? Had he not led them out of Egypt and given them this beautiful land for a possession? But had Israel been grateful for this? – had he made any return? – had he kept the covenant which Jehovah had made with him, and his law? At the best sacrifices were offered at Jerusalem, prayer was made to bull-images at Dan and Bethel. But how many were there who worshipped Baal, Astarte, and Ashera! How regardless of their duties were the rich, and the judges, how luxurious and dissolute in their lives! Was this the way to fulfil the commands of the just and holy God?

From this arose a peculiar class of ideas. Jehovah had chosen Israel for his people before other nations. He desires to protect him and grant him his favour. But how can he, the pure and holy God, grant protection and defence, if his people live an impure and unholy life? To protect sinners would be against his own nature. Jehovah was a severe and jealous God; was he not to punish the defection from his service, the faithlessness and ingratitude of the nation, with grievous punishment? Must he not visit these wrong-doers with a heavy penalty? The Assyrians were on the Euphrates. From these suppositions, and the conclusion that Jehovah, according to his pure and holy being as well as his severe nature, must punish the error of the people; that he could not allow the breach of the ancient covenant, the defection, the worship of idols, the injustice, and the luxury to remain unvisited, grew up the idea of a great sentence about to be executed on Israel and Judah. Among the prophets this became a settled conviction. But according to their conception, Jehovah is raised far above the weakness and the anger of men. If his people return to him, amend their conversation, and serve him with their lips and their heart, he will in his mercy pardon them, or the punishment which he sends upon them will be merely a purification; the stiff-necked obstinacy of the hard heart he will break; many will fall, but he will spare those who are true to him; and when he has corrected his people by a severe judgment, he will exalt them anew, and take up his abode on Zion.

Filled with these conceptions the prophets came forward soon after the beginning of the eighth century. They are no longer sooth-sayers and seers; they do not predict any more; they do not announce definite facts; they only know what will and must be the consequences of the sinful life of the people: they proclaim a great judgment; they declare what must be done in order to turn aside the wrath of Jehovah. Impelled by inward certainty to ascertain and reveal the nature and will of Jehovah, filled with religious inspiration, and in a tone of deepest earnestness, the prophets give to their utterances an expression of force and fire, which forms a proper sequel to the beautiful beginnings of lyric poetry, as we have learned to know them in the songs of victory, in the strains of thanksgiving and lamentation of the Israelites, in the psalms – a sequel which corresponds to the power and importance of the spiritual movement from which the exhortations of the prophets arise. With unwearied zeal they exhort the people to return to their ancient God and trust in him alone. Then, as Israel's power began to decline after the death of Jeroboam and Uzziah, the view and conception of the prophets becomes higher and higher; the more threatening and dangerous the position of affairs, the greater their influence; and at the time when the political existence of the Israelites was broken down, their religious life is perfected and purified, into a thorough recognition of ethical monotheism.

A man of the kingdom of Judah, Amos of Tekoa, a place not far from Jerusalem, prophesied in Israel in the first decades of the reign of Jeroboam, between 790 and 760 B.C. He calls himself "neither a prophet, nor the son of a prophet;" he assures us that he was not a disciple of the prophets, and did not wear the usual garb of a prophet, i. e. a poor coarse clothing. He adds that he was a herdsman and a planter of sycamores: "Jehovah took me from following the flock, and said to me; Go and prophesy to my people in Israel."[51 - Amos i. 2; iv. 9.] From these prophecies, which he afterwards wrote down, it is plain that the Holy Scriptures, in the form in which the two texts had been united and revised by the hand of a prophet, were familiar to him and present before him; that the prophecies of Joel were known to him.[52 - The date of Amos is fixed not only by the superscription, but by the mention of the house of Jeroboam in his prophecies. Moreover, the desolation caused by the Damascenes in Israel, the campaigns of the Philistines against Judah (II. 252), appear to be in recent remembrance. If the "fallen tabernacle of David, the breaches in its wall," are also mentioned (ix. 11, 12), it is clear that Uzziah, who came to the throne in the year 792 B.C. at an age of 16 years, had not completely restored Judah, that he had not recovered Elath. On the other hand, it is clear that Gath was already taken. Hence Amos cannot have come forward before the tenth or twelfth year of Uzziah, i. e. before 782 or 780, according to our computation (p. 18, note). The canon of the Assyrians agrees with this in putting the campaign of Bin-nirar to the coast in the year 803 B.C.; and afterwards records the last campaign of the Assyrians to Damascus before the time of Tiglath Pilesar II. in the year 773 B.C.; after which time only contests against Hadrach (772-765) and against Arpad are mentioned (p. 2), which Tiglath Pilesar then resumes in the year 743 B.C. In Amos the Assyrians are still in the back-ground.] It was in Bethel, the chief place of sacrifice in Israel, that he came forward. There, at the place of the bull-image, he proclaimed the wickedness of this worship, and branded in still stronger terms the moral corruption of the land. In vain had Jehovah uttered warnings by his prophets; the law was not regarded; justice was crooked; the weak were oppressed. No doubt Amos exaggerated his reproaches, but we cannot doubt that the faults he attacked were in existence. The careless he threatened with the destruction which would soon burst upon them if they remained without repentance or improvement. Then would the high places of Isaac be laid waste, and the shrines of Israel destroyed, and Jehovah would rise up with the sword against the house of Jeroboam. The priests of Israel could not endure to hear such utterances. The high priest at Bethel, Amaziah, said to Amos: "Seer, go flee thee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread and prophesy. Prophesy not again any more at Bethel: for it is the king's chapel, and the king's court." Amos answered: "Thou sayest, Prophesy not against Israel, and drop not thy word against the house of Isaac. Therefore thus saith Jehovah: Thy wife shall be an harlot in the city, and thy sons and thy daughters shall fall by the sword, and thy land shall be divided by a line; and thou shalt die in polluted land: and Israel shall surely go into captivity forth of his land." Then Amaziah the priest sent to king Jeroboam: "Amos hath conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel; the land is not able to bear all his words; for he saith, By the sword shall Jeroboam die, and Israel shall be led captive out of his land."

The proclamations of Amos were not directed against Israel alone. He threatens the Damascenes and the Ammonites with vengeance for the devastations they had caused in Gilead (II. 258); the Philistines because they had carried away captives from Judah and sold them (II. 303); the city of Tyre because she put the captives of Judah in the hands of the Edomites; the Edomites because they pursued their brothers (the Judæans) with the sword (II. 252). Nor does he even spare the kingdom of Judah; even there the law of Jehovah is despised, and his ordinances are not kept. But the judgment of Jehovah will descend only on the guilty, and when the day of judgment is over Jehovah will again purify Israel and set up Zion.

"Did I not bring you up from Egypt?" so Amos represents Jehovah as saying; "Did I not lead you forty years in the wilderness, to possess the land of the Amorites? Did I not destroy the Amorites before you, who were tall as cedars, and strong as oaks? Did I not raise up prophets from your sons, and Nazarites from your young men?[53 - Amos ii. 9-12.] Hear this word, ye who oppress the weak and trample underfoot the poor;[54 - Amos viii. 4; v. 12.] ye who stretch yourselves beside the altar on garments taken in pledge, and drink the wine of the condemned in the house of your gods; ye who overpower the just, and make the poor bow down at the gate;[55 - Amos ii. 6, 7.] who purchase the thirsty for silver, and the helpless for a pair of shoes;[56 - Amos viii. 6.] who, father and son together, go to one mistress, and say: When is the new moon over that we may sell grain, and the day of rest that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel great, and falsifying the balance for deception. Do men hunt the horse on the rocks, and plough the stone with oxen, that ye may turn justice into poison, and the fruit of righteousness into hemlock?[57 - Amos vi. 12.] Because ye trample down the weak, and oppress them with burdens, ye have planted pleasant vineyards, and built houses of hewn stone.[58 - Amos v. 11.] O ye that are at ease in Zion, ye careless ones in the mount of Samaria, who imagine that the day of destruction is far off, and draw near the seat of violence; who lie on beds of ivory, and stretch yourselves on couches; who eat up the lambs of the flock and the calves of the stall; who chant to the sound of the harp, in order to invent instruments of music like David;[59 - Amos vi. 1-7.] who empty your wine cups, and anoint yourselves with the chief oil, and trouble not yourselves for the affliction of Joseph; ye shall not dwell in your houses, and drink the wine out of your pleasant gardens: ye shall go forth into misery, with the first that go captive.[60 - Amos v. 11.] Go to Bethel, and transgress; to Gilgal, and multiply transgression. Bring your sacrifices every morning, and your tithes on the third day; burn thank-offerings, and publish the free will offerings.[61 - Amos iv. 4, 5.] Seek me not at Bethel, and go not to Gilgal and Beersheba. I hate your festivals, and will not taste your offerings, or look on the thank-offering of your stalled calves. Take from me the noise of your songs, and let me not hear the sound of the harp.[62 - Amos v. 21-23.] Let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream. Seek good, and not evil, that ye may live: establish judgment in the gate; it may be that Jehovah will have mercy on the remnant of Joseph. Hate the evil, and love the good, so will Jehovah, the God of hosts, be with you."[63 - Amos v. 14, 15, 24.]

"But they multiply injustice and robbery in their palaces. The end of my people Israel draws near; I will not overlook it longer in him. I will change your festivals into lamentation, and all your songs into mourning, and will bring sackcloth about your loins. The enemy comes round the land, and tears down the power of Israel, and his palaces are plundered.[64 - Amos iii. 10, 11; vi. 2.] Go to Calneh, and see, and from thence pass to Hamath the great (II. 317, supr. p. 15), and go down to Gath (p. 18); are ye better than these kingdoms, or is your land greater? I raise against you a nation which will force you from Hamath unto the river of the plain.[65 - Amos vi. 14.] At the time when I avenge the evil of Israel upon him, and the altars of Bethel, the horns of the altar will fall to the ground. I will smite the winter house and the summer house; the houses of ivory shall fall to the ground.[66 - Amos iii. 14, 15.] The flight shall perish from the swift; the bowman shall not stand, the horseman shall not deliver himself, and the most courageous among the mighty shall flee away naked on that day.[67 - Amos ii. 14-16.] All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword, which say: The evil shall not overtake us.[68 - Amos ix. 10.] But I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob. I will shake them as a man shaketh a sieve, and not a grain shall fall to the ground. The days come when the ploughman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that soweth seed, and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and I will bring again the captivity of my people Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them, and I will plant them fast in the land, which I have given to them, that they be no more pulled out."

Amos had not deceived himself as to the want of inward cohesion in the circumstances of Israel. The days of Jeroboam II. were coming to an end. The power which he had gained for his kingdom, the order he had given to it, were not so firmly fixed that they outlived the founders. His son Zachariah, who ascended the throne in 749 B.C., remained on it for half a year only. He was murdered "before the people" by a man of the name of Shallum, the son of Jabesh, who placed himself at the head of a conspiracy, and with him the house of Jehu came to an end in the fourth generation. Shallum seized the throne, but maintained it only a month. Menahem, the son of Gadi, rebelled against him in Tirzah, defeated and slew him, and took his place on the throne (748 B.C.).[69 - 2 Kings xv. 8-15.] He met with resistance in the land; internal strife distracted Israel, and loosed all the bonds of order. "The idols have spoken vanity," so we find it in the older Zachariah; "and the diviners have seen a lie, and have told false dreams; they comfort in vain; therefore they went their way as a flock; they were troubled, because they had no shepherd. Mine anger was kindled against the shepherds, and I will punish the goats.[70 - Zech. x. 2, 3.] I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land, saith Jehovah; but lo! I will deliver the men, every man into his neighbour's hand, and into the hand of his king, and they shall smite the land, and out of their hand I will not deliver them. Three shepherds also I cut off in one month;[71 - King Zachariah, and then Shallum: the third is the opponent of Menahem who sought to maintain himself in Tipsach (Taanach?).] and my soul loathed them; and I said, I will not feed you: that which dieth, let it die; and that which is to be cut off, let it be cut off, and let the rest eat every one the flesh of another. For lo! I will raise up a shepherd in the land which shall not visit those that be cut off, nor seek the strayed one, nor heal that which is wounded; but he shall eat the flesh of the fat. Woe to the worthless shepherd that leaveth the flock! the sword shall be upon his right arm, and upon his right eye. His arm shall be clean dried up, and his right eye darkened.[72 - Zech. xi. 6, 8, 9, 16, 17.] Open thy doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour thy cedars! Howl, cypress, for the cedar is fallen; for the heights are made desolate: howl, O oaks of Bashan; for the steep forest sinketh! Listen to the howling of the shepherds; for their glory is spoiled: listen to the roaring of lions, for the pride of Jordan is desolate.[73 - Zech. xi. 1-3.] The burden descends on Hadrach, and on Damascus; on Hamath that shall border thereby; on Tyre and Sidon, though it be very wise. Tyre built herself a stronghold, and heaped up silver as the dust, and fine gold as the mire of the streets. Behold, the Lord will take her, and cast her walls into the sea, and she shall be consumed by fire. Ascalon shall see it, and fear; Gaza, and be very sorrowful, and Ekron, for her expectation shall be ashamed; and the king shall perish from Gaza, and Ascalon is uninhabited. A strange race shall dwell in Ashdod, and I will destroy the pride of the Philistines.[74 - Zech. ix. 1-6.] And I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim, and horses from Jerusalem. But Jehovah shall save them in that day as the flock of his people; they are the stones of a crown lifted up upon his land."[75 - Zech. ix. 10, 16.]

Even earlier, in the last years of the reign of Jeroboam, or the beginning of the reign of his son Zachariah, Hosea, the son of Beeri, had received the word. "Yet a little time," such is the word of Jehovah in his lips, "and I will avenge the bloodguiltiness of Jezreel on the house of Jehu (the murder of Jehoram and Jezebel by Jehu, II. 254), and put an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel; and at the same time I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel."[76 - Hosea i. 4, 5.] When Zachariah fell before Shallum, and Jehu's house was destroyed, we find in Hosea, "They chose kings without me (Jehovah), captains of whom I knew nothing." "I will give thee a king in my anger, and take him away in wrath. All your kings shall fall, for none of them call upon me. Israel is a heifer that cannot be tied."[77 - Hosea viii. 4; iv. 16; vii. 7; xiii. 11.] The prophet demands with the greatest vehemence that the worship of images shall be given up, and the bull-images at Dan and Bethel (II. 237) removed: that robbery and murder come to an end, that Israel turn to Jehovah; the judgment threatens, and there is no helper but Jehovah.[78 - Hosea xiii. 4.] "Hear this, ye priests; receive it, house of Israel; and thou, house of the king, take heed thereof," cries Hosea.[79 - Hosea v. 1.] "When Israel was a child I loved him, saith Jehovah; I called my son from Egypt. In the desert, in the land of great drought, I did know thee.[80 - Hosea xiii. 5.] I taught Ephraim to go, taking them by the arm; I drew them with human cords, with bands of love; I took off the yoke from their backs, and laid meat unto them.[81 - Hosea xi. 1-4.] Israel was an empty vine, but the more that his fruit increased, the more altars did he build; the better his land, the more beautiful pillars did he set up.[82 - Hosea x. 1.] They made images of their silver according to their knowledge, idols, the work of craftsmen, and said: Let them that sacrifice kiss the calves.[83 - Hosea xiii. 2.] They sacrifice on the tops of the mountains, and burn incense on the hills, under oaks, and poplars, and elms, because the shadow thereof is good.[84 - Hosea iv. 13.] I will go after my lovers, saith Israel, the faithless wife, who give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink; and she knows not that Jehovah increased her corn and sweet wine, and oil, and silver.[85 - Hosea ii. 5-8.] There is no faithfulness, no love, no knowledge of God in the land. Ye have ploughed wickedness and reaped iniquity, and have eaten the fruit of lies.[86 - Hosea x. 13.] They practise swearing and lying, and stealing, and adultery, and violence; the priests commit murder on the way to Shechem; they practise all iniquity in Gilgal, and bloodguiltiness is joined to bloodguiltiness.[87 - Hosea iv. 2.] They slay flesh for sacrifice, and eat it.[88 - Hosea viii. 13.] I desire not sacrifice but mercy; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.[89 - Hosea vi. 6.] Therefore in my own time I will take back my corn; I will tear away my wool and my flax from the harlot Israel; and make an end to her festivals, her new moons, her sabbaths, and avenge on her the days of Baal, when she offered incense to them which placed their nose-ring and ornaments upon her, and went after her lovers, and loved the hire of the harlot at every thrashing floor, but forgat me."[90 - Hosea ii. 9-13; ix. 1.]

"Israel hath forgotten his creator, and built palaces, and Judah hath multiplied his fortified cities,"[91 - Hosea viii. 14.] says the prophet in regard to the fortresses built by Uzziah (p. 19). "They trusted to the number of thy warriors, but Israel's king passes away like a morning cloud. Ephraim is as a silly dove; they call on Egypt; they go to Assyria to bring whoredom. Ephraim goes after Asshur, and sends to the king for help. Ephraim will hunt after the wind, and strain after the East wind, that they may make a covenant with Assyria, and carry oil to Egypt.[92 - Hosea xii. 2.] The Deliverer king will not heal you. The East will come; a wind of Jehovah will rise out of the desert, which will plunder the treasure of costly furniture, and Samaria will repent. The calf of Bethaven (= house of Evil, – thus the prophet alters the name of Bethel = house of God, the chief place of worship in the kingdom of Israel) will be carried to Assyria, as a gift to the king, the Deliverer; Asshur shall be their king, for they will not amend. The days of punishment, of vengeance will come; as to the people, so shall it happen to the priests. Israel's pride shall be bowed down, and Judah shall fall with him. They shall not remain in the land of Jehovah; Ephraim shall return to Egypt, and eat unclean things in Assyria. They are gone because of destruction; Egypt shall gather them up, and Memphis shall bury them.[93 - Hosea ix. 1-6; v. 13; vii. 11; viii. 9; x. 6; xi. 5; xiii. 15; xiv. 1.] The high places of Bethaven shall be destroyed; thorns and thistles shall come up on their altars, and they shall say to the mountains, Cover us; and to the hills, Fall on us."[94 - Hosea x. 8.]

"What shall I do to thee, Ephraim? how shall I deal with thee? Shall I destroy thee? saith Jehovah. But my heart is turned, my repentings are kindled; I will not execute the fierceness of my wrath; I am God and not man; as the Holy One I will not come into anger.[95 - Hosea xi. 9.] I will punish them till they repent, and in their affliction they will seek me early.[96 - Hosea v. 15.] I will allure them into the wilderness; I will speak to their hearts, that Israel may sing again as in the days of his youth, and on the day when he came out of Egypt; and the name of Baal I will remove out of his mouth.[97 - Hosea ii. 14-17.] Return, O Israel, to Jehovah thy God. Speak ye to him; Take away iniquity, and receive us, that we offer the sacrifice of our lips. Assyria shall not save us; we will not ride on horses; the work of our hands shall be called our gods no more.[98 - Hosea xiv. 2-4.] Then, saith Jehovah: I will hear Ephraim, and look with favour upon him. I will heal their backsliding, and come and love them freely; my anger is turned away, and I will let them dwell in their houses. I will be as dew upon Israel; Israel shall grow as a lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon: and I will betroth thee unto me for ever; I will betroth thee in righteousness and in judgment, in loving-kindness, gentleness, and mercies."[99 - Hosea xiv. 5-9; ii. 19.]

The words of Hosea leave no doubt that Menahem, king of Israel, sought aid from Assyria in order to maintain himself on the throne. With this the Books of Kings agree. They tell us: Menahem gave to the king of Assyria 1000 kikkar of silver (according to the Babylonian standard about £300,000), "that the king might join him in establishing the kingdom in his hand." The payment of the money was imposed by Menahem on all the men of substance in Israel; fifty shekels of silver on every man. According to this the king of Israel was himself without means, but the land must have been in a position to pay such a considerable tribute, so large a sum. There must, according to this statement, have been at this time 60,000 families in Israel who were in a position to pay a mina each (about £5). The monuments of Assyria inform us that in the year 742 B.C. Tiglath Pilesar marched against northern Syria and Arpad (Tel Erfad p. 2); that he conquered Arpad after a siege of three years, or after three campaigns against the city.[100 - Lists of rulers, 742-740, "during three years he conquered Arpad."] In the city of Arpad – so we are told in a fragment of his annals – he received the tribute of Rezin of Damascus; 18 kikkar of gold, 3000 kikkar of silver, 200 kikkar of copper; and the tribute of Kustaspi of Kummukh, of Hiram of Tyre, of Pisiris of Karchemish.[101 - Frag. 6, in G. Smith, p. 274.] This must, therefore, have taken place in the year 740 or 739 B.C. He received the tribute of Menahem immediately before the ninth year of his reign (737 B.C.), i. e. in the year 738 B.C. He tells us that at that time he received tribute from Kustaspi of Kummukh, Rezin of Damascus, Menahem of Samaria, Hiram of Tyre, Sibittibal of Gebal (Byblus), Urikki of Kui (Cilicia), Pisiris of Karchemish, Eniel of Hamath, Tarchular of Gamguma, Sulumal of Milid, Vassurmi of Tubal, and Zabibieh, the queen of the Arabs. Menahem, therefore, sought to purchase the help of Tiglath Pilesar by offering tribute soon after the fall of Arpad. Hence in these years the king of Assyria held a position which included northern and central Syria, and governed those countries immediately from the crossing of the Euphrates at Karchemish, and from Arpad. Passing beyond Hamath and Damascus, beyond Byblus and Tyre, he was now ruler over the kingdom of Samaria also. From the South-east a princess of the Arabs, from the North-west the prince of the Cilicians, sent tribute. Menahem of Israel must have died soon after the payment of tribute; the subjection to Assyria appears to have established his power so far that his son Pekahiah could succeed him on the throne (738 B.C.). But in the second year of his reign Pekahiah was murdered in the palace at Samaria by Pekah, the son of Remaliah, who now ascended the throne of Israel (736 B.C.). Pekah combined with Rezin, king of Damascus, for a united attack on the kingdom of Judah.

Judah did not remain untouched by the establishment and extensive advances of the Assyrian power in Syria. We saw in what successful struggles Uzziah-Azariah had extended the territory of Judah in his long reign; how agriculture and trade developed under him. The advance of Tiglath Pilesar in the last years of the reign of Uzziah called these successes in question once more. It did not find Uzziah wholly unprepared. He had fortified Jerusalem more strongly; he had provided for the arming of his forces, and arranged the levy of the men of military age. A very mutilated fragment of the annals of Tiglath Pilesar mentions twice the land of Judah, and three times the second half of the name of Azariah, i. e. the name by which Uzziah is named in the Books of Kings.[102 - Eberhard Schrader, "Jahrb. protest. Theolog." 1876, s. 374.] Another fragment, which deals with the events in Syria which took place before the payment of tribute to Menahem, again mentions Azariah (Uzziah); it informs us that Mount Lebanon, the land of Baalzephon,[103 - A different Baalzephon from that on the Red Sea; Exod. xiv. 2, 9.] the land of Ammana (the region of the Amanus?) the city of Hadrach had been subjugated; that the king "added to the land of Assyria nineteen districts of Hamath, situated on the sea of the setting sun, together with the cities in their land, which had revolted to Azariah in faithless rebellion, and had placed his officers and viceroys over them."[104 - Schrader, loc. cit. s. 375; Rodwell, "Records of the Past," 5, 46; G. Smith, "Disc." p. 277.] The districts of Hamath here mentioned must be sought between the Orontes and the sea, immediately north of Aradus. The occurrence no doubt took place in the time when Tiglath Pilesar fought against or besieged Arpad, i. e. in the years from 742 B.C. to 740. From this we must conclude that Azariah (Uzziah) of Judah (neither he nor the kingdom of Judah is mentioned among the tributary states in these fragments) assumed a hostile position towards Tiglath Pilesar; that during the struggle for Arpad he attempted to unite some of the states and tribes of Syria against the advance of Assyria. This opposition of Judah may have formed another motive for Menahem to place himself under the supremacy, and at the same time under the protection, of Tiglath Pilesar. As vassals of Tiglath Pilesar, Rezin of Damascus and Pekah of Israel may have felt themselves more justified in attacking the southern neighbour-state, the kingdom of Judah, which would not submit to the dominion of Assyria.

Uzziah was no more when Pekah obtained the throne of Israel. He had died four years previously (740 B.C.), and was buried in the sepulchres of the kings at Jerusalem. His son Jotham, who had already shared in the rule during the last years of his father's reign, sat on the throne of Judah. He withstood the attack of the combined Israelites and Damascenes.[105 - 2 Kings xv. 5, 7, 37.] But his son Ahaz, who succeeded him in the year 734 B.C., was reduced by this war to the greatest distress. The Philistines whom Uzziah had repelled and punished severely, the Edomites whom he had subjugated, rebelled. Pekah's warriors laid Judah waste, and carried rich booty and numerous prisoners to Samaria; Rezin pressed forward to the south to aid the Edomites, expelled the Judæans from Elath, and there established himself on the Red Sea. The hostile armies marched on Jerusalem. Ahaz "made his son to go through the fire" to avert the threatened ruin. At last he found no other means of rescue than to pay homage to Assyria, and entreat the protection of Tiglath Pilesar.

In the last years of Uzziah, and in the reign of Jotham, Isaiah, the son of Amoz, had received the word at Jerusalem. Like Amos and Hosea, Isaiah contended against the luxury and dissoluteness of the rich, the injustice of the elders, the corruption of the judges, the idolatry in the land. He attacked the false security in which men reposed in the possession of horses and chariots of war; he announced the coming vengeance with even more vehement emphasis than his predecessors. If for them the gods of the other nations have already disappeared beside the One Jehovah, Isaiah represents the approaching destruction as breaking out not only over Israel and Judah, but over all nations, because they go after false gods. Their evil deeds will also be punished; no power on the earth can stand before Jehovah. But behind this judgment, the horror of which will turn all men to Jehovah, Isaiah also exhibits the restoration of Israel and Judah, the restoration of the whole renewed world, in the most glowing colours. That was Jehovah's purpose "since the days of old."

"The land is full of horses," so Isaiah spake, "and there is no end of its chariots." As we have seen, Uzziah had amassed munitions of war, and arranged excellently the military power (p. 19), – "but the land is also full of idols, and they worship the work of their own hands. Every man oppresses his neighbour; the young man behaves proudly against the old, and the base against the honourable. Thy chiefs, O Jerusalem, are faithless men, the companions of thieves![106 - Isa. ii. 7. The moral precepts of Isaiah are collected in the text without regard to the chronology.] Every one loves bribery, and seeks after gain. They do no justice to the orphan, and regard not the cause of the widow. Woe to them that decree unrighteous decrees, and to the scribes who write iniquity, to turn aside the needy from judgment, and to take away the right from the poor![107 - Isa. x. 1, 2.] Woe to them who justify the wicked for reward, and take away the right of the just![108 - Isa. v. 23.] Woe to them that join house to house, and field to field, till they alone are possessors of the land![109 - Isa. v. 8.] What mean ye to beat my people in pieces, saith Jehovah, and grind the faces of the poor?[110 - Isa. iii. 14, 15.] Woe to them that rise up early in the morning, and follow strong drink, who heated with wine sit till the night; and the harp, and the viol, the tabret, and pipe, and wine, are in their feasts![111 - Isa. v. 11, 12.] Woe to them that are mighty to drink wine, and men of strength to mingle strong drink! Woe to them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter; that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight! Woe to them who draw upon them punishment with cords of vanity, and reward of sin with a cart-rope!"[112 - Isa. v. 18-22.]

Isaiah carried the Jews from the service of sacrifice to the improvement of the heart, to righteous conversation and good works. "To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me?" so Isaiah represents Jehovah as saying. "I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of stalled calves; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, lambs, and he-goats. Who hath required of you to tread my courts? Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth; they are trouble to me, I am weary to bear them. Bring no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination to me: when ye spread forth your hands I will hide mine eyes from you; and when ye pray, I will not hear you.[113 - Isa. i. 10-15.] With your mouth ye draw near to me, and with your lips ye honour me; but your heart ye keep far from me, and your fear of me is taught by the precept of men.[114 - Isa. xxix. 13.] Relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead the cause of the widow. Wash you, make you clean, put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil."[115 - Isa. i. 16, 17.]

"What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done to it? Wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes? Ye have turned my vineyard into a pasture; the spoil of the poor is in your houses. Now I will take away the hedge, and pull down the walls, that it may be trodden down.[116 - Isa. v. 4, 5, 3, 14.] I will come to judgment with your elders and chiefs, and I will deal marvellously with this people; the wisdom of their wise men, and the understanding of the prudent shall be hid."[117 - Isa. xxix. 14.] After Isaiah had depicted the terrors of the day of judgment, the quaking of the earth, the creeping away and the death of sinners, in lively colours, he represents the people as crying out: "Who of us shall dwell with the devouring fire, and the everlasting flame?" and then answers: "He that walketh righteously, and speaketh uprightly; who despiseth the gain of oppressions; that turneth his hands from holding of bribes, and stoppeth his ears from hearing of blood, and shutteth his eyes from seeing evil; who taketh justice for his measuring line and righteousness for his balance: he shall dwell on high; his place of defence shall be the munitions of the rock, and his waters shall not be dried up. Though your sins be red like scarlet, they shall be white as snow, if ye obey Jehovah."[118 - Isa. xxxiii. 14-16; i. 18, 19.]

With the death of Jotham the distress increased. Isaiah warns his people not to seek aid from Assyria. "Wickedness," he cries, "burneth as fire; no man shall spare his fellow. He shall snatch on the right hand and be hungry; and eat on the left hand and be unsatisfied. Manasseh shall eat Ephraim, and Ephraim Manasseh, and both together shall fall upon Judah."[119 - Isa. ix. 17-20.] "Fear not," he says to king Ahaz, "neither be faint-hearted, for the two tails of these smoking firebrands; for the fierce anger of Rezin and the son of Remaliah; they shall not break open Jerusalem, and the land, before whose kings thou art afraid, shall soon be made desolate.[120 - Isa. vii. 4, 6, 16.] But with the razor that is hired beyond the river (Euphrates) the Lord will shear off thy head, and the hair of thy feet, and thy beard."[121 - Isa. vii. 20.] And when Ahaz refused to be restrained, Isaiah proclaimed: "Because Israel rejoices in Rezin and the son of Remaliah, the Lord will bring upon them the waters of the river strong and many. The stream shall come up over all his channels, and go over all his banks; the riches of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria shall be taken away before the king of Assyria. But the stream shall pass through Judah; it shall overflow and go over till it reaches even to the neck."[122 - Isa. viii. 4-8.]

"Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath Pilesar, king of Assyria," so the Books of Kings tell us, "saying, I am thy servant and thy son; come up and save me out of the hands of the king of Aram (of Damascus) and the king of Israel. And Ahaz took the silver and gold that was found in the house of Jehovah, and in the treasures of the king's house, and sent a present to the king of Assyria. Then the king of Assyria gave ear to him. He marched out against Damascus and took it, and carried away the inhabitants to Kir, and slew Rezin. And in Israel Tiglath Pilesar took Ijon and Abel-beth-Maachah, and Janoha, and Kedesh, and Hazor, and Gilead, the whole land of Naphtali, and led them away to Assyria. And Hoseas, the son of Elah, set on foot a conspiracy against Pekah, and defeated him, and slew him, and was king in his place. But Ahaz went to Damascus to meet king Tiglath Pilesar."[123 - 2 Kings xv. 29, 30; xvi. 5-10.]

The Assyrian list of rulers mentions for the year 734 B.C. a campaign of Tiglath Pilesar against the land of the Philistines, and for the years 733 and 732 B.C. campaigns of the king against Damascus. A fragment of the annals informs us that the army of Damascus was defeated; that their king Rezin (Rasunnu) fled to the great gate of his city; that his captive generals were crucified; that the city was besieged; that Hadara, the house of the father of Rezin, was taken; that 591 places in 16 districts of the kingdom of Damascus (Imirisu) were laid waste.[124 - Frag. 10, in G. Smith, "Disc." p. 282; E. Schrader, "K. A. T." s. 151.] A further fragment informs us that Tiglath Pilesar made himself master of the cities of Hadrach, Zemar, and Arka (the two ancient cities of the Phenicians on the coast, already known to us); that he reached the borders of the land of Omri (Israel); that Hanno, king of Gaza, fled to Egypt before the face of the warrior Tiglath Pilesar. Afterwards the fragment mentions the land of Omri, speaks of a sending or carrying away to Assyria, and continues: "Pekah (Pakaha) their king they had slain. Hoseas (Husi) I made king over them."[125 - Frag. 12, in G. Smith, p. 224, 225; Rodwell, "Records of the Past," 5, 52; E. Schrader, "K. A. T." s. 145.] The inscription, which comprises the deeds of Tiglath Pilesar down to the last year of his reign, mentions towards the end the princes of Assyria, who brought him tribute: Sibittibal of Byblus, Eniel of Hamath, Mattanbal of Arvad, Sanib of Ammon (Bit Ammanai), Salman of Moab, Mitinti of Ascalon, Ahaz of Judah (Jauhazi, Jahudai), Kosmalak of Edom, Hanno (Hanun) of Gaza.[126 - Ll. 57-62, in G. Smith, "Disc." p. 262, 263; E. Schrader, loc. cit. s. 147.]

The attempt of Rezin of Damascus and Pekah of Israel to break the rise of the Philistines and Edomites, and the power of the kingdom of Judah, fortified as it was and strengthened by Uzziah, led to important consequences, to the subjugation of Syria to Assyria throughout its whole extent. When Ahaz called for help, Tiglath Pilesar turned against the enemies of Judah. The kingdom of Damascus, which for 120 years had so powerfully withstood the Assyrians, succumbed after a struggle of two years. Tyre and Byblus had long paid tribute to Tiglath Pilesar, and now Aradus was compelled to recognise the supremacy of Assyria; Israel was overrun: the inhabitants of the northern towns – Ijon, Abel-beth-maacha, Hazor and Kedesh, and the dwellers in the land of Naphtali on the lakes of Merom and Genezareth, and of the land of Gilead – were carried away to Assyria. The eastern neighbours of Israel and of the land of Gilead, the Ammonites and Moabites, were driven to submit like the Edomites; the cities of the Philistines were conquered. With the subjugation of Ascalon and Gaza the Assyrian kingdom became the neighbour of Egypt.

CHAPTER III.