ARCHAEOLOGY DAY
Friday, September 30, 2011
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
HEZEKIAH CONTINUED
Historical accounts in 2 Kings 18-20 and 2 Chro 29-32 annels are derived largely from the records of the same state, although the latter seems to have had in the archives of the Temple to appeal. For "the rest of his acts" 2 Kings refers to a source then still in existence, but has lost, "the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah" (2Ki_20: 20), and 2 Chronicles "the vision prophet Isaiah, son of Amos, in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel "(2Ch_32: 32). In the latter source, the name (if this is the original of our book of Isaiah.) Addition to the warnings and instructions called by the course of history, there is a narrative section (Isa 36-39) recounts the crisis of Sennacherib much like the other stories, but also includes a passage Isaianic prophecy (Isa 37:22-32) and a "writing of Hezekiah king of Judah" (Isa_38 :10-20). Finally, in Sirach 48: 17-25, is a summary of the good deeds and wise men of Hezekiah, drawn from the accounts we already have.
Illustration from Sirach, c. 1751.
The Israelite annals are mentioned 18 times (I Kings 14:19 (17); 15:31; 16:5; et al.) and the Judean annals 15 times (I Kings 14:29; 15:7, 23; et al.). Of all the kings of Israel, only Jehoram and Hosea are not mentioned as referred to in the Israeliteannals. Of the kings of Judah (after Solomon) only Ahaziah, Athaliah, Jehoahaz, Jehoiachin, and Zedekiah are not mentioned in this regard. It is uncertain whether these books were royal records themselves or edited annals based on the records. It seems likely in view of the negative references to certain kings (Zimri, Shallum, and Manasseh), which would not very likely be the product of the king's own recorders, that the books were edited annals. Furthermore, the Judean author of Kings could hardly have had access to all the royal records of the northern kingdom. The content of these books appears identical in character to the Assyrian annals. Probably the mass of facts on royal activities in Kings came from these books. Chronicles mentions the book of the kings of Israel (I Chron. 9:1; II Chron. 20:34) and the book of the kings of Israel and Judah (or Judah and Israel; II Chron. 16: 11; 27:7; et al.). The chronicler seems to be referring to the same works, but probably did not actually have them at his disposal.
Ki 18:13-37
Sennacherib invades Judah and threatens Jerusalem.
(Note: We have a parallel and elaborate account of this campaign of Sennacherib and his defeat (2 Kings 18:13-19:37), and also of Hezekiah's sickness and recovery and the arrival of the Babylonian embassy in Jerusalem (2 Kings 20:1-19), in Isa 36-39, and a brief extract, with certain not unimportant supplements, in 2 Chron 32. These three narratives, as is now generally admitted, are drawn independently of one another from a collection of the prophecies of Isaiah, which was received into the annals of the kingdom (2Ch_32:32), and serve to confirm and complete one another.)
- Sennacherib, סַנְחֵרִיב (Sanchērı̄bh), Σενναχηρίμ (lxx), Σεναχήριβος (Joseph.), Σαναχάριβος (Herodot.), whose name has not yet been deciphered with certainty upon the Assyrian monuments or clearly explained (see J. Brandis uber den histor. Gewinn aus der Entzifferung der assyr. Inschriften, pp. 103ff., and M. v. Niebuhr, Gesch. Assurs, p. 37), was the successor of Salmanasar (Sargina according to the monuments). He is called βασιλεὺς Ἀραβίων τε καὶ Ἀσσυρίων by Herodotus (ii. 141), and reigned, according to Berosus, eighteen years. He took all the fortified cities in Judah (יִפְּשֵׂם, with the masculine suffix instead of the feminine: cf. Ewald, §184, c.). The כֹּל, all, is not to be pressed; for, beside the strongly fortified capital Jerusalem, he had not yet taken the fortified cities of Lachish and Libnah (2Ki_18:17 and 2Ki_19:8) at the time, when, according to 2Ki_18:14., he sent a division of his army against Jerusalem, and summoned Hezekiah to surrender that city. According to Herodotus (l.c.), the real object of his campaign was Egypt, which is also apparent from 2Ki_19:24, and is confirmed by Isa_10:24; for which reason Tirhaka marched against him (2Ki_19:8; cf. M. v. Niebuhr, Gesch. Assurs, pp. 171, 172).
2Ki_18:14-16
On the report of Sennacherib's approach, Hezekiah made provision at once for the safety of Jerusalem. He had the city fortified more strongly, and the fountain of the upper Gihon and the brook near the city stopped up (see at 2Ki_18:17), to cut off the supply of water from the besiegers, as is stated in 2Ch_32:2-8, and confirmed by Isa_22:8-11. In the meantime Sennacherib had pressed forward to Lachish, i.e., Um Lakis, in the plain of Judah, on the south-west of Jerusalem, seven hours to the west of Eleutheropolis on the road to Egypt (see at Jos_10:3); so that Hezekiah, having doubts as to the possibility of a successful resistance, sent ambassadors to negotiate with him, and promised to pay him as much tribute as he might demand if he would withdraw. The confession “I have sinned” is not to be pressed, inasmuch as it was forced from Hezekiah by the pressure of distress. Since Asshur had made Judah tributary by faithless conduct on the part of Tiglath-pileser towards Ahaz, there was nothing really wrong in the shaking off of this yoke by the refusal to pay any further tribute. But Hezekiah certainly did wrong, when, after taking the first step, he was alarmed at the disastrous consequences, and sought to purchase once more the peace which he himself had broken, by a fresh submission and renewal of the payment of tribute. This false step on the part of the pious king, which arose from a temporary weakness of faith, was nevertheless turned into a blessing through the pride of Sennacherib and the covenant-faithfulness of the Lord towards him and his kingdom. Sennacherib demanded the enormous sum of three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold (more than two and a half million thalers, or £375,000); and Hezekiah not only gave him all the gold and silver found in the treasures of the temple and palace, but had the gold plates with which he had covered the doors and doorposts of the temple (2Ch_29:3) removed, to send them to the king of Assyria. הָאֹמְנֹות, lit., the supports, i.e., the posts, of the doors.
These negotiations with Sennacherib on the part of Hezekiah are passed over both in the book of Isaiah and also in the Chronicles, because they had no further influence upon the future progress of the war.
2Ki_18:17
For though Sennacherib did indeed take the money, he did not depart, as he had no doubt promised, but, emboldened still further by this submissiveness, sent a detachment of his army against Jerusalem, and summoned Hezekiah to surrender the capital. “He sent Tartan, Rabsaris, and Rabshakeh.” Rabshakeh only is mentioned in Isaiah, as the chief speaker in the negotiations which follow, although in Isa_37:6 and Isa_37:24 allusion is evidently made to the other two. Tartan had no doubt the chief command, since he is not only mentioned first here, but conducted the siege of Ashdod, according to Isa_20:1. The three names are probably only official names, or titles of the offices held by the persons mentioned. For רַב־סָרִיס means princeps eunuchorum, and רַבְשָׁקֵה chief cup-bearer. תַּרְתָּן is explained by Hitzig on Isa_20:1 as derived from the Persian târ-tan, “high person or vertex of the body,” and in Jer_39:3 as “body-guard;” but this is hardly correct, as the other two titles are Semitic. These generals took up their station with their army “at the conduit of the upper pool, which ran by the road of the fuller's field,” i.e., the conduit which flowed from the upper pool - according to 2Ch_32:30, the basin of the upper Gihon (Birket el Mamilla) - into the lower pool (Birket es Sultân: see at 1Ki_1:33). According to Isa_7:3, this conduit was in existence as early as the time of Ahaz. The “end” of it is probably the locality in which the conduit began at the upper pool or Gihon, or where it first issued from it. This conduit which led from the upper Gihon into the lower, and which is called in 2Ch_32:30 “the outflow of the upper Gihon,” Hezekiah stopped up, and conducted the water downwards, i.e., the underground, towards the west into the city of David; that is to say, he conducted the water of the upper Gihon, which had previously flowed along the western side of the city outside the wall into the lower Gihon and so away down the valley of Ben-hinnom, into the city itself by means of a subterranean channel,
(Note: We may get some idea of the works connected with this aqueduct from the description of the “sealed fountain” of the Solomon's pool at Ain Saleh in Tobler, Topogr. v. Jerus. ii. pp. 857ff., Dritte Wanderung.)
that he might retain this water for the use of the city in the event of a siege of Jerusalem, and keep it from the besiegers.
This water was probably collected in the cistern (הַבְּרֵכָה) which Hezekiah made, i.e., order to be constructed (2Ki_20:20), or the reservoir “between the two walls for the waters of the old pool,” mentioned in Isa_22:11, i.e., most probably the reservoir still existing at some distance to the east of the Joppa gate on the western side of the road which leads to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the so-called “pool of Hezekiah,” which the natives call Birket el Hamman, “Bathing-pool,” because it supplies a bath in the neighbourhood, or B. el Batrak, “Patriarch's pool” (see Robinson, Pal. i. p. 487, and Fresh Researches into the Topography of Jerusalem, pp. 111ff.), since this is still fed by a conduit from the Mamilla pool (see E. G. Schultz, Jerusalem, p. 31, and Tobler, Denkblätter, pp. 44ff.).
(Note: The identity of the ברכה, which Hezekiah constructed as a reservoir for the overflow of the upper Gihon that was conducted into the city (2Ki_20:20), with the present “pool of Hezekiah” is indeed very probable, but not quite certain. For in very recent times, on digging the foundation for the Evangelical church built on the northern slope of Zion, they lighted upon a large well-preserved arched channel, which was partly cut in the rock, and, where this was not the case, built in level layers and coated within with a hard cement about an inch thick and covered with large stones (Robinson, New Inquiries as to the Topography of Jerusalem, p. 113, and Bibl. Res. p. 318), and which might possibly be connected with the channel made by Hezekiah to conduct the water of the upper Gihon into the city, although this channel does not open into the pool of Hezekiah, and the walls, some remains of which are still preserved, may belong to a later age. The arguments adduced by Thenius in support of the assumption that the “lower” or “old pool” mentioned in Isa_22:9 and Isa_22:11 is different from the lower Gihon-pool, and to be sought for in the Tyropoeon, are inconclusive. It by no means follows from the expression, “which lies by the road of the fuller's field,” i.e., by the road which runs past the fuller's field, that there was another upper pool in Jerusalem beside the upper pool (Gihon); but this additional clause simply serves to define more precisely the spot by the conduit mentioned where the Assyrian army took its stand; and it by no means follows from the words of Isa_22:11, “a gathering of waters have ye made between the two walls for the waters of the old pool,” that this gathering of waters was made in the Tyropoeon, and that this “old pool,” as distinguished from the lower pool (Isa_22:9), was an upper pool, which was above the king's pool mentioned in Neh_3:15. For even if החמתים בין occurs in 2Ki_25:4; Jer_39:4; Jer_52:7, in connection with a locality on the south-east side of the city, the Old Testament says nothing about two pools in the Tyropoeon at the south-east corner of Jerusalem, but simply mentions a fountain gate, which probably derived its name from the present fountain of the Virgin, and the king's pool, also called Shelach in Neh_2:14; Neh_3:15, which was no doubt fed from that fountain like the present Siloam, and watered the royal gardens. (Compare Rob. Pal. i. pp. 565ff., and Bibl. Res. p. 189, and Tobler, Die Siloah-quelle u. der Oelberg, pp. 1ff.). The two walls, between which Hezekiah placed the reservoir, may very well be the northern wall of Zion and the one which surrounded the lower city (Acra) on the north-west, according to which the words in Isa_22:11 would admirably suit the “pool of Hezekiah.” Again, Hezekiah did not wait till the departure of Sennacherib before he built this conduit, which is also mentioned in Wis. 48:17, as Knobel supposes (on Isa_22:11), but he made it when he first invaded Judah, before the appearance of the Assyrian troops in front of Jerusalem, when he made the defensive preparations noticed at v. 14, as is evident from 2Ch_32:3-4, compared with 2Ki_18:30, since the stopping up of the fountain outside the city, to withdraw the water from the Assyrians, is expressly mentioned in 2Ki_18:3, 2Ki_18:4 among the measures of defence; and in the concluding notices concerning Hezekiah in 2Ki_20:20, and 2Ch_32:30, there is also a brief allusion to this work, without any precise indication of the time when he had executed it.)
2Ki_18:18
Hezekiah considered it beneath his dignity to negotiate personally with the generals of Sennacherib. He sent three of his leading ministers out to the front of the city: Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, the captain of the castle, who had only received the appointment to this office a short time before in Shebna's place (Isa_22:20-21); Shebna, who was still secretary of state (סֹפֵר: see at 2Sa_8:17); and Joach the son of Asaph, the chancellor (מַזְכִּיר: see at 2Sa_8:16).
Rabshakeh made a speech to these three (2Ki_18:19-25), in which he tried to show that Hezekiah's confidence that he would be able to resist the might of the king of Assyria was perfectly vain, since neither Egypt (2Ki_18:21), nor his God (2Ki_18:22), nor his forces (2Ki_18:23), would be able to defend him.
2Ki_18:19
“The great king:” the Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian kings all assumed this title (cf. Eze_26:7; Dan_2:37), because kings of conquered lands were subject to them as vassals (see at Isa_10:8). “What is this confidence that thou cherishest?” i.e., how vain or worthless is this confidence!
2Ki_18:20
“Thou sayest ... it is only a lip-word...: counsel and might for battle;” i.e., if thou speakest of counsel and might for battle, that is only שְׂפָתַיִם דְּבַר, a word that merely comes from the lips, not from the heart, the seat of the understanding, i.e., a foolish and inconsiderate saying (cf. Pro_14:23; Job_11:2). - עָמַרְתָּ is to be preferred to the אָמַרְתִּי of Isaiah as the more original of the two. עַתָּה, now, sc. we will see on whom thou didst rely, when thou didst rebel against me.
2Ki_18:21
On Egypt? “that broken reed, which runs into the hand of any one who would lean upon it (thinking it whole), and pierces it through.” This figure, which is repeated in Eze_29:6-7, is so far suitably chosen, that the Nile, representing Egypt, is rich in reeds. What Rabshakeh says of Egypt here, Isaiah had already earnestly impressed upon his people (Isa_30:3-5), to warn them against trusting in the support of Egypt, from which one party in the nation expected help against Assyria.
2Ki_18:22
Hezekiah (and Judah) had a stronger ground of confidence in Jehovah his God. Even this Rabshakeh tried to shake, availing himself very skilfully, from his heathen point of view, of the reform which Hezekiah had made in the worship, and representing the abolition of the altars on the high places as an infringement upon the reverence that ought to be shown to God. “And if ye say, We trust in Jehovah our God, (I say:) is it not He whose high places and altars Hezekiah has taken away and has said to Judah and Jerusalem, Ye shall worship before this altar (in the temple) in Jerusalem?” Instead of הֹאמְרוּ כִּי, according to which Rabshakeh turned to the deputies, we have in Isa_7:7 תֹאמַר כִּי, according to which the words are addressed to Hezekiah, as in 2Ki_18:20. הֹאמְרוּ is preferred by Thenius, Knobel, and others, because in what follows Hezekiah is addressed in the third person. but the very circumstance that הֹאמְרוּ is apparently more suitable favours the originality of תֹאמַר, according to which the king is still addressed in the person of his ambassadors, and Rabshakeh only speaks directly to the ambassadors when this argument is answered. The attack upon the confidence which the Judaeans placed in their God commences with הוּא הֲלֹוא. The opinion of Thenius, that the second clause of the verse is a continuation of the words supposed to be spoken by the Judaeans who trusted in God, and that the apodosis does not follow till 2Ki_18:23, is quite a mistake. The ambassadors of Hezekiah could not regard the high places and idolatrous altars that had been abolished as altars of Jehovah; and the apodosis could not commence with וְעַתָּה.
2Ki_18:23-24
Still less could Hezekiah rely upon his military resources. נָא הִתְעָרֶב: enter, I pray thee, (into contest) with my lord, and I will give thee 2000 horses, if thou canst set the horsemen upon them. The meaning, of course, is not that Hezekiah could not raise 2000 soldiers in all, but that he could not produce so many men who were able to fight as horsemen. “How then wilt thou turn back a single one of the smallest lieutenants of my lord?” פל אֶת־פְּנֵי הֵשִׁיב, to repulse a person's face, means generally to turn away a person with his petition (1Ki_2:16-17), here to repulse an assailant. אַחַד פַּחַת is one pasha; although אַחַד hguo, which is grammatically subordinate to פַּחַת, is in the construct state, that the genitives which follow may be connected (for this subordination of אֶחָד see Ewald, §286, a.). פֶּחָה (see at 1Ki_10:15), lit., under-vicegerent, i.e., administrator of a province under a satrap, in military states also a subordinate officer. וַתִּבְטַח: and so (with thy military force so small) thou trustest in Egypt וגו לָרֶכֶב, so far as war-chariots and horsemen are concerned.
2Ki_18:25
After Rabshakeh had thus, as he imagined, taken away every ground of confidence from Hezekiah, he added still further, that the Assyrian king himself had also not come without Jehovah, but had been summoned by Him to effect the destruction of Judah. It is possible that some report may have reached his ears of the predictions of the prophets, who had represented the Assyrian invasion as a judgment from the Lord, and these he used for his own purposes. Instead of הַזֶּה הַמָּקֹום עַל, against this place, i.e., Jerusalem, we have הַזֹּאת הָאָרֶץ עַל in Isaiah, - a reading which owes its origin simply to the endeavour to bring the two clauses into exact conformity to one another.
2Ki_18:26-37
It was very conceivable that Rabshakeh's boasting might make an impression upon the people; the ambassadors of Hezekiah therefore interrupted him with the request that he would speak to them in Aramaean, as they understood that language, and not in Jewish, on account of the people who were standing upon the wall. אֲרָמִית was the language spoken in Syria, Babylonia, and probably also in the province of Assyria, and may possibly have been Rabshakeh's mother-tongue, even if the court language of the Assyrian kings was an Aryan dialect. With the close affinity between the Aramaean and the Hebrew, the latter could not be unknown to Rabshakeh, so that he made use of it, just as the Aramaean language was intelligible to the ministers of Hezekiah, whereas the people in Jerusalem understood only יְהוּדִיה, Jewish, i.e., the Hebrew language spoken in the kingdom of Judah. It is evident from the last clause of the verse that the negotiations were carried on in the neighbourhood of the city wall of Jerusalem.
2Ki_18:27
But Rabshakeh rejected this proposal with the scornful remark, that his commission was not to speak to Hezekiah and his ambassadors only, but rather to the people upon the wall. The variation of the preposition עַל and אֶל in אֲדֹנֶיךָ עַל אֲדֹנֶי, to thy lord (Hezekiah), and אֵלֶיךָ, to thee (Eliakim as chief speaker), is avoided in the text of Isaiah. עַל is frequently used for אֶל, in the later usage of the language, in the sense of to or at. In the words “who sit upon the wall to eat their dung and drink their urine,” Rabshakeh points to the horrors which a siege of Jerusalem would entail upon the inhabitants. For חריהם = חַרְאֵיהֶם, excrementa sua, and שֵׁינֵיהֶם, urinas suas, the Masoretes have substituted the euphemisms צֹואָתָם, going forth, and רַגְלֵיהֶם מֵימֵי, water of their feet.
2Ki_18:28-30
וַיַּעֲמֹוד: not, he stood up, raised himself (Ges.), or came forward (Then.), but he stationed himself, assumed an attitude calculated for effect, and spoke to the people with a loud voice in the Jewish language, telling them to listen to the king of Assyria and not to be led astray by Hezekiah, i.e., to be persuaded to defend the city any longer, since neither Hezekiah nor Jehovah could defend them from the might of Sennacherib. אַל־יַשִּׁיא: let not Hezekiah deceive you, sc. by pretending to be able to defend or save Jerusalem. In מִיָּדֹו, “out of his (the Assyrian's) hand,” the speaker ceases to speak in the name of his king. On the construction of the passive תִּנָּתֵן with אֶת־הָעִיר, see Ewald, §277, d., although in the instance before us he proposes to expunge the אֵת after Isa_36:15.
2Ki_18:31-32
“Make peace with me and come out to me (sc., out of your walls, i.e., surrender to me), and ye shall eat every one his vine, ... till I come and bring you into a land like your own land...” בְּרָכָה is used here to signify peace as the concentration of weal and blessing. The imperative וְעִכְלוּ expresses the consequence of what goes before (vid., Ewald, §347, b.). To eat his vine and fig-tree and to drink the water of his well is a figure denoting the quiet and undisturbed enjoyment of the fruits of his own possession (cf. 1Ki_5:5). Even in the event of their yielding, the Assyrian would transport the Jewish people into another land, according to the standing custom of Asiatic conquerors in ancient times (for proofs see Hengstenberg, De rebus Tyriis, pp. 51, 52). To make the people contented with this thought, the boaster promised that the king of Assyria would carry them into a land which was quite as fruitful and glorious as the land of Canaan. The description of it as a land with corn and new wine, etc., recalls the picture of the land of Canaan in Deu_8:8 and Deu_33:28. יִצְהָר זֵית is the olive-tree which yields good oil, in distinction from the wild olive-tree. וגו וִחְיוּ: and ye shall live and not die, i.e., no harm shall befall you from me (Thenius). This passage is abridged in Isa_36:17.
2Ki_18:33-34
Even Jehovah could not deliver them any more than Hezekiah. As a proof of this, Rabshakeh enumerated a number of cities and lands which the king of Assyria had conquered, without their gods' being able to offer any resistance to his power. “Where are the gods of Hamath, etc., that they might have delivered Samaria out of my hand?” Instead of הִצִּילוּ כִּי we have הץ וְכִי and that they might have, which loosens the connection somewhat more between this clause and the preceding one, and makes it more independent. “Where are they?” is equivalent to they are gone, have perished (cf. 2Ki_19:18); and “that they might have delivered” is equivalent to they have not delivered. The subject to הִצִּילוּ כִּי is הַגֹּויִם אֱלֹהֵי, which includes the God of Samaria. Sennacherib regards himself as being as it were one with his predecessors, as the representative of the might of Assyria, so that he attributes to himself the conquests of cities and lands which his ancestors had made. The cities and lands enumerated in 2Ki_18:34 have been mentioned already in 2Ki_17:24 as conquered territories, from which colonists had been transplanted to Samaria, with the exception of Arpad and Hena. אַרְפָּד, which is also mentioned in 2Ki_19:13; Isa_10:9; Isa_36:19; Isa_37:13, and Jer_49:23, in connection with Hamath, was certainly situated in the neighbourhood of that city, and still exists, so far as the name is concerned, in the large village of rfâd, Arfâd (mentioned by Maraszid, i. 47), in northern Syria in the district of Azâz, which was seven hours to the north of Haleb, according to Abulf. Tab. Syr. ed. Köhler, p. 23, and Niebuhr, Reise, ii. p. 414 (see Roediger, Addenda ad Ges. thes. p. 112). הֵנַע, Hena, which is also combined with 'Ivvah in 2Ki_19:13 and Isa_37:13, is probably the city of 'ânt Ana, on the Euphrates, mentioned by Abulf., and עִוָּה is most likely the same as עַוָּא in 2Ki_17:24. The names וְעִוָּה הֵנַע are omitted from the text of Isaiah in consequence of the abridgment of Rabshakeh's address.
2Ki_18:35
2Ki_18:35 contains the conclusion drawn from the facts already adduced: “which of all the gods of the lands are they who have delivered their land out of my hand, that Jehovah should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?” i.e., as not one of the gods of the lands named have been able to rescue his land from Assyria, Jehovah also will not be able to defend Jerusalem.
2Ki_18:36-37
The people were quite silent at this address (“the people,” הָעָם, to whom Rabshakeh had wished to address himself); for Hezekiah had forbidden them to make any answer, not only to prevent Rabshakeh from saying anything further, but that the ambassadors of Sennacherib might be left in complete uncertainty as to the impression made by their words. The deputies of Hezekiah returned to the king with their clothes rent as a sign of grief at the words of the Assyrian, by which not only Hezekiah, but still more Jehovah, had been blasphemed, and reported what they had heard.
Ki 18:13-37
Sennacherib invades Judah and threatens Jerusalem.
(Note: We have a parallel and elaborate account of this campaign of Sennacherib and his defeat (2 Kings 18:13-19:37), and also of Hezekiah's sickness and recovery and the arrival of the Babylonian embassy in Jerusalem (2 Kings 20:1-19), in Isa 36-39, and a brief extract, with certain not unimportant supplements, in 2 Chron 32. These three narratives, as is now generally admitted, are drawn independently of one another from a collection of the prophecies of Isaiah, which was received into the annals of the kingdom (2Ch_32:32), and serve to confirm and complete one another.)
- Sennacherib, סַנְחֵרִיב (Sanchērı̄bh), Σενναχηρίμ (lxx), Σεναχήριβος (Joseph.), Σαναχάριβος (Herodot.), whose name has not yet been deciphered with certainty upon the Assyrian monuments or clearly explained (see J. Brandis uber den histor. Gewinn aus der Entzifferung der assyr. Inschriften, pp. 103ff., and M. v. Niebuhr, Gesch. Assurs, p. 37), was the successor of Salmanasar (Sargina according to the monuments). He is called βασιλεὺς Ἀραβίων τε καὶ Ἀσσυρίων by Herodotus (ii. 141), and reigned, according to Berosus, eighteen years. He took all the fortified cities in Judah (יִפְּשֵׂם, with the masculine suffix instead of the feminine: cf. Ewald, §184, c.). The כֹּל, all, is not to be pressed; for, beside the strongly fortified capital Jerusalem, he had not yet taken the fortified cities of Lachish and Libnah (2Ki_18:17 and 2Ki_19:8) at the time, when, according to 2Ki_18:14., he sent a division of his army against Jerusalem, and summoned Hezekiah to surrender that city. According to Herodotus (l.c.), the real object of his campaign was Egypt, which is also apparent from 2Ki_19:24, and is confirmed by Isa_10:24; for which reason Tirhaka marched against him (2Ki_19:8; cf. M. v. Niebuhr, Gesch. Assurs, pp. 171, 172).
2Ki_18:14-16
On the report of Sennacherib's approach, Hezekiah made provision at once for the safety of Jerusalem. He had the city fortified more strongly, and the fountain of the upper Gihon and the brook near the city stopped up (see at 2Ki_18:17), to cut off the supply of water from the besiegers, as is stated in 2Ch_32:2-8, and confirmed by Isa_22:8-11. In the meantime Sennacherib had pressed forward to Lachish, i.e., Um Lakis, in the plain of Judah, on the south-west of Jerusalem, seven hours to the west of Eleutheropolis on the road to Egypt (see at Jos_10:3); so that Hezekiah, having doubts as to the possibility of a successful resistance, sent ambassadors to negotiate with him, and promised to pay him as much tribute as he might demand if he would withdraw. The confession “I have sinned” is not to be pressed, inasmuch as it was forced from Hezekiah by the pressure of distress. Since Asshur had made Judah tributary by faithless conduct on the part of Tiglath-pileser towards Ahaz, there was nothing really wrong in the shaking off of this yoke by the refusal to pay any further tribute. But Hezekiah certainly did wrong, when, after taking the first step, he was alarmed at the disastrous consequences, and sought to purchase once more the peace which he himself had broken, by a fresh submission and renewal of the payment of tribute. This false step on the part of the pious king, which arose from a temporary weakness of faith, was nevertheless turned into a blessing through the pride of Sennacherib and the covenant-faithfulness of the Lord towards him and his kingdom. Sennacherib demanded the enormous sum of three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold (more than two and a half million thalers, or £375,000); and Hezekiah not only gave him all the gold and silver found in the treasures of the temple and palace, but had the gold plates with which he had covered the doors and doorposts of the temple (2Ch_29:3) removed, to send them to the king of Assyria. הָאֹמְנֹות, lit., the supports, i.e., the posts, of the doors.
These negotiations with Sennacherib on the part of Hezekiah are passed over both in the book of Isaiah and also in the Chronicles, because they had no further influence upon the future progress of the war.
2Ki_18:17
For though Sennacherib did indeed take the money, he did not depart, as he had no doubt promised, but, emboldened still further by this submissiveness, sent a detachment of his army against Jerusalem, and summoned Hezekiah to surrender the capital. “He sent Tartan, Rabsaris, and Rabshakeh.” Rabshakeh only is mentioned in Isaiah, as the chief speaker in the negotiations which follow, although in Isa_37:6 and Isa_37:24 allusion is evidently made to the other two. Tartan had no doubt the chief command, since he is not only mentioned first here, but conducted the siege of Ashdod, according to Isa_20:1. The three names are probably only official names, or titles of the offices held by the persons mentioned. For רַב־סָרִיס means princeps eunuchorum, and רַבְשָׁקֵה chief cup-bearer. תַּרְתָּן is explained by Hitzig on Isa_20:1 as derived from the Persian târ-tan, “high person or vertex of the body,” and in Jer_39:3 as “body-guard;” but this is hardly correct, as the other two titles are Semitic. These generals took up their station with their army “at the conduit of the upper pool, which ran by the road of the fuller's field,” i.e., the conduit which flowed from the upper pool - according to 2Ch_32:30, the basin of the upper Gihon (Birket el Mamilla) - into the lower pool (Birket es Sultân: see at 1Ki_1:33). According to Isa_7:3, this conduit was in existence as early as the time of Ahaz. The “end” of it is probably the locality in which the conduit began at the upper pool or Gihon, or where it first issued from it. This conduit which led from the upper Gihon into the lower, and which is called in 2Ch_32:30 “the outflow of the upper Gihon,” Hezekiah stopped up, and conducted the water downwards, i.e., the underground, towards the west into the city of David; that is to say, he conducted the water of the upper Gihon, which had previously flowed along the western side of the city outside the wall into the lower Gihon and so away down the valley of Ben-hinnom, into the city itself by means of a subterranean channel,
(Note: We may get some idea of the works connected with this aqueduct from the description of the “sealed fountain” of the Solomon's pool at Ain Saleh in Tobler, Topogr. v. Jerus. ii. pp. 857ff., Dritte Wanderung.)
that he might retain this water for the use of the city in the event of a siege of Jerusalem, and keep it from the besiegers.
This water was probably collected in the cistern (הַבְּרֵכָה) which Hezekiah made, i.e., order to be constructed (2Ki_20:20), or the reservoir “between the two walls for the waters of the old pool,” mentioned in Isa_22:11, i.e., most probably the reservoir still existing at some distance to the east of the Joppa gate on the western side of the road which leads to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the so-called “pool of Hezekiah,” which the natives call Birket el Hamman, “Bathing-pool,” because it supplies a bath in the neighbourhood, or B. el Batrak, “Patriarch's pool” (see Robinson, Pal. i. p. 487, and Fresh Researches into the Topography of Jerusalem, pp. 111ff.), since this is still fed by a conduit from the Mamilla pool (see E. G. Schultz, Jerusalem, p. 31, and Tobler, Denkblätter, pp. 44ff.).
(Note: The identity of the ברכה, which Hezekiah constructed as a reservoir for the overflow of the upper Gihon that was conducted into the city (2Ki_20:20), with the present “pool of Hezekiah” is indeed very probable, but not quite certain. For in very recent times, on digging the foundation for the Evangelical church built on the northern slope of Zion, they lighted upon a large well-preserved arched channel, which was partly cut in the rock, and, where this was not the case, built in level layers and coated within with a hard cement about an inch thick and covered with large stones (Robinson, New Inquiries as to the Topography of Jerusalem, p. 113, and Bibl. Res. p. 318), and which might possibly be connected with the channel made by Hezekiah to conduct the water of the upper Gihon into the city, although this channel does not open into the pool of Hezekiah, and the walls, some remains of which are still preserved, may belong to a later age. The arguments adduced by Thenius in support of the assumption that the “lower” or “old pool” mentioned in Isa_22:9 and Isa_22:11 is different from the lower Gihon-pool, and to be sought for in the Tyropoeon, are inconclusive. It by no means follows from the expression, “which lies by the road of the fuller's field,” i.e., by the road which runs past the fuller's field, that there was another upper pool in Jerusalem beside the upper pool (Gihon); but this additional clause simply serves to define more precisely the spot by the conduit mentioned where the Assyrian army took its stand; and it by no means follows from the words of Isa_22:11, “a gathering of waters have ye made between the two walls for the waters of the old pool,” that this gathering of waters was made in the Tyropoeon, and that this “old pool,” as distinguished from the lower pool (Isa_22:9), was an upper pool, which was above the king's pool mentioned in Neh_3:15. For even if החמתים בין occurs in 2Ki_25:4; Jer_39:4; Jer_52:7, in connection with a locality on the south-east side of the city, the Old Testament says nothing about two pools in the Tyropoeon at the south-east corner of Jerusalem, but simply mentions a fountain gate, which probably derived its name from the present fountain of the Virgin, and the king's pool, also called Shelach in Neh_2:14; Neh_3:15, which was no doubt fed from that fountain like the present Siloam, and watered the royal gardens. (Compare Rob. Pal. i. pp. 565ff., and Bibl. Res. p. 189, and Tobler, Die Siloah-quelle u. der Oelberg, pp. 1ff.). The two walls, between which Hezekiah placed the reservoir, may very well be the northern wall of Zion and the one which surrounded the lower city (Acra) on the north-west, according to which the words in Isa_22:11 would admirably suit the “pool of Hezekiah.” Again, Hezekiah did not wait till the departure of Sennacherib before he built this conduit, which is also mentioned in Wis. 48:17, as Knobel supposes (on Isa_22:11), but he made it when he first invaded Judah, before the appearance of the Assyrian troops in front of Jerusalem, when he made the defensive preparations noticed at v. 14, as is evident from 2Ch_32:3-4, compared with 2Ki_18:30, since the stopping up of the fountain outside the city, to withdraw the water from the Assyrians, is expressly mentioned in 2Ki_18:3, 2Ki_18:4 among the measures of defence; and in the concluding notices concerning Hezekiah in 2Ki_20:20, and 2Ch_32:30, there is also a brief allusion to this work, without any precise indication of the time when he had executed it.)
2Ki_18:18
Hezekiah considered it beneath his dignity to negotiate personally with the generals of Sennacherib. He sent three of his leading ministers out to the front of the city: Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, the captain of the castle, who had only received the appointment to this office a short time before in Shebna's place (Isa_22:20-21); Shebna, who was still secretary of state (סֹפֵר: see at 2Sa_8:17); and Joach the son of Asaph, the chancellor (מַזְכִּיר: see at 2Sa_8:16).
Rabshakeh made a speech to these three (2Ki_18:19-25), in which he tried to show that Hezekiah's confidence that he would be able to resist the might of the king of Assyria was perfectly vain, since neither Egypt (2Ki_18:21), nor his God (2Ki_18:22), nor his forces (2Ki_18:23), would be able to defend him.
2Ki_18:19
“The great king:” the Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian kings all assumed this title (cf. Eze_26:7; Dan_2:37), because kings of conquered lands were subject to them as vassals (see at Isa_10:8). “What is this confidence that thou cherishest?” i.e., how vain or worthless is this confidence!
2Ki_18:20
“Thou sayest ... it is only a lip-word...: counsel and might for battle;” i.e., if thou speakest of counsel and might for battle, that is only שְׂפָתַיִם דְּבַר, a word that merely comes from the lips, not from the heart, the seat of the understanding, i.e., a foolish and inconsiderate saying (cf. Pro_14:23; Job_11:2). - עָמַרְתָּ is to be preferred to the אָמַרְתִּי of Isaiah as the more original of the two. עַתָּה, now, sc. we will see on whom thou didst rely, when thou didst rebel against me.
2Ki_18:21
On Egypt? “that broken reed, which runs into the hand of any one who would lean upon it (thinking it whole), and pierces it through.” This figure, which is repeated in Eze_29:6-7, is so far suitably chosen, that the Nile, representing Egypt, is rich in reeds. What Rabshakeh says of Egypt here, Isaiah had already earnestly impressed upon his people (Isa_30:3-5), to warn them against trusting in the support of Egypt, from which one party in the nation expected help against Assyria.
2Ki_18:22
Hezekiah (and Judah) had a stronger ground of confidence in Jehovah his God. Even this Rabshakeh tried to shake, availing himself very skilfully, from his heathen point of view, of the reform which Hezekiah had made in the worship, and representing the abolition of the altars on the high places as an infringement upon the reverence that ought to be shown to God. “And if ye say, We trust in Jehovah our God, (I say:) is it not He whose high places and altars Hezekiah has taken away and has said to Judah and Jerusalem, Ye shall worship before this altar (in the temple) in Jerusalem?” Instead of הֹאמְרוּ כִּי, according to which Rabshakeh turned to the deputies, we have in Isa_7:7 תֹאמַר כִּי, according to which the words are addressed to Hezekiah, as in 2Ki_18:20. הֹאמְרוּ is preferred by Thenius, Knobel, and others, because in what follows Hezekiah is addressed in the third person. but the very circumstance that הֹאמְרוּ is apparently more suitable favours the originality of תֹאמַר, according to which the king is still addressed in the person of his ambassadors, and Rabshakeh only speaks directly to the ambassadors when this argument is answered. The attack upon the confidence which the Judaeans placed in their God commences with הוּא הֲלֹוא. The opinion of Thenius, that the second clause of the verse is a continuation of the words supposed to be spoken by the Judaeans who trusted in God, and that the apodosis does not follow till 2Ki_18:23, is quite a mistake. The ambassadors of Hezekiah could not regard the high places and idolatrous altars that had been abolished as altars of Jehovah; and the apodosis could not commence with וְעַתָּה.
2Ki_18:23-24
Still less could Hezekiah rely upon his military resources. נָא הִתְעָרֶב: enter, I pray thee, (into contest) with my lord, and I will give thee 2000 horses, if thou canst set the horsemen upon them. The meaning, of course, is not that Hezekiah could not raise 2000 soldiers in all, but that he could not produce so many men who were able to fight as horsemen. “How then wilt thou turn back a single one of the smallest lieutenants of my lord?” פל אֶת־פְּנֵי הֵשִׁיב, to repulse a person's face, means generally to turn away a person with his petition (1Ki_2:16-17), here to repulse an assailant. אַחַד פַּחַת is one pasha; although אַחַד hguo, which is grammatically subordinate to פַּחַת, is in the construct state, that the genitives which follow may be connected (for this subordination of אֶחָד see Ewald, §286, a.). פֶּחָה (see at 1Ki_10:15), lit., under-vicegerent, i.e., administrator of a province under a satrap, in military states also a subordinate officer. וַתִּבְטַח: and so (with thy military force so small) thou trustest in Egypt וגו לָרֶכֶב, so far as war-chariots and horsemen are concerned.
2Ki_18:25
After Rabshakeh had thus, as he imagined, taken away every ground of confidence from Hezekiah, he added still further, that the Assyrian king himself had also not come without Jehovah, but had been summoned by Him to effect the destruction of Judah. It is possible that some report may have reached his ears of the predictions of the prophets, who had represented the Assyrian invasion as a judgment from the Lord, and these he used for his own purposes. Instead of הַזֶּה הַמָּקֹום עַל, against this place, i.e., Jerusalem, we have הַזֹּאת הָאָרֶץ עַל in Isaiah, - a reading which owes its origin simply to the endeavour to bring the two clauses into exact conformity to one another.
2Ki_18:26-37
It was very conceivable that Rabshakeh's boasting might make an impression upon the people; the ambassadors of Hezekiah therefore interrupted him with the request that he would speak to them in Aramaean, as they understood that language, and not in Jewish, on account of the people who were standing upon the wall. אֲרָמִית was the language spoken in Syria, Babylonia, and probably also in the province of Assyria, and may possibly have been Rabshakeh's mother-tongue, even if the court language of the Assyrian kings was an Aryan dialect. With the close affinity between the Aramaean and the Hebrew, the latter could not be unknown to Rabshakeh, so that he made use of it, just as the Aramaean language was intelligible to the ministers of Hezekiah, whereas the people in Jerusalem understood only יְהוּדִיה, Jewish, i.e., the Hebrew language spoken in the kingdom of Judah. It is evident from the last clause of the verse that the negotiations were carried on in the neighbourhood of the city wall of Jerusalem.
2Ki_18:27
But Rabshakeh rejected this proposal with the scornful remark, that his commission was not to speak to Hezekiah and his ambassadors only, but rather to the people upon the wall. The variation of the preposition עַל and אֶל in אֲדֹנֶיךָ עַל אֲדֹנֶי, to thy lord (Hezekiah), and אֵלֶיךָ, to thee (Eliakim as chief speaker), is avoided in the text of Isaiah. עַל is frequently used for אֶל, in the later usage of the language, in the sense of to or at. In the words “who sit upon the wall to eat their dung and drink their urine,” Rabshakeh points to the horrors which a siege of Jerusalem would entail upon the inhabitants. For חריהם = חַרְאֵיהֶם, excrementa sua, and שֵׁינֵיהֶם, urinas suas, the Masoretes have substituted the euphemisms צֹואָתָם, going forth, and רַגְלֵיהֶם מֵימֵי, water of their feet.
2Ki_18:28-30
וַיַּעֲמֹוד: not, he stood up, raised himself (Ges.), or came forward (Then.), but he stationed himself, assumed an attitude calculated for effect, and spoke to the people with a loud voice in the Jewish language, telling them to listen to the king of Assyria and not to be led astray by Hezekiah, i.e., to be persuaded to defend the city any longer, since neither Hezekiah nor Jehovah could defend them from the might of Sennacherib. אַל־יַשִּׁיא: let not Hezekiah deceive you, sc. by pretending to be able to defend or save Jerusalem. In מִיָּדֹו, “out of his (the Assyrian's) hand,” the speaker ceases to speak in the name of his king. On the construction of the passive תִּנָּתֵן with אֶת־הָעִיר, see Ewald, §277, d., although in the instance before us he proposes to expunge the אֵת after Isa_36:15.
2Ki_18:31-32
“Make peace with me and come out to me (sc., out of your walls, i.e., surrender to me), and ye shall eat every one his vine, ... till I come and bring you into a land like your own land...” בְּרָכָה is used here to signify peace as the concentration of weal and blessing. The imperative וְעִכְלוּ expresses the consequence of what goes before (vid., Ewald, §347, b.). To eat his vine and fig-tree and to drink the water of his well is a figure denoting the quiet and undisturbed enjoyment of the fruits of his own possession (cf. 1Ki_5:5). Even in the event of their yielding, the Assyrian would transport the Jewish people into another land, according to the standing custom of Asiatic conquerors in ancient times (for proofs see Hengstenberg, De rebus Tyriis, pp. 51, 52). To make the people contented with this thought, the boaster promised that the king of Assyria would carry them into a land which was quite as fruitful and glorious as the land of Canaan. The description of it as a land with corn and new wine, etc., recalls the picture of the land of Canaan in Deu_8:8 and Deu_33:28. יִצְהָר זֵית is the olive-tree which yields good oil, in distinction from the wild olive-tree. וגו וִחְיוּ: and ye shall live and not die, i.e., no harm shall befall you from me (Thenius). This passage is abridged in Isa_36:17.
2Ki_18:33-34
Even Jehovah could not deliver them any more than Hezekiah. As a proof of this, Rabshakeh enumerated a number of cities and lands which the king of Assyria had conquered, without their gods' being able to offer any resistance to his power. “Where are the gods of Hamath, etc., that they might have delivered Samaria out of my hand?” Instead of הִצִּילוּ כִּי we have הץ וְכִי and that they might have, which loosens the connection somewhat more between this clause and the preceding one, and makes it more independent. “Where are they?” is equivalent to they are gone, have perished (cf. 2Ki_19:18); and “that they might have delivered” is equivalent to they have not delivered. The subject to הִצִּילוּ כִּי is הַגֹּויִם אֱלֹהֵי, which includes the God of Samaria. Sennacherib regards himself as being as it were one with his predecessors, as the representative of the might of Assyria, so that he attributes to himself the conquests of cities and lands which his ancestors had made. The cities and lands enumerated in 2Ki_18:34 have been mentioned already in 2Ki_17:24 as conquered territories, from which colonists had been transplanted to Samaria, with the exception of Arpad and Hena. אַרְפָּד, which is also mentioned in 2Ki_19:13; Isa_10:9; Isa_36:19; Isa_37:13, and Jer_49:23, in connection with Hamath, was certainly situated in the neighbourhood of that city, and still exists, so far as the name is concerned, in the large village of rfâd, Arfâd (mentioned by Maraszid, i. 47), in northern Syria in the district of Azâz, which was seven hours to the north of Haleb, according to Abulf. Tab. Syr. ed. Köhler, p. 23, and Niebuhr, Reise, ii. p. 414 (see Roediger, Addenda ad Ges. thes. p. 112). הֵנַע, Hena, which is also combined with 'Ivvah in 2Ki_19:13 and Isa_37:13, is probably the city of 'ânt Ana, on the Euphrates, mentioned by Abulf., and עִוָּה is most likely the same as עַוָּא in 2Ki_17:24. The names וְעִוָּה הֵנַע are omitted from the text of Isaiah in consequence of the abridgment of Rabshakeh's address.
2Ki_18:35
2Ki_18:35 contains the conclusion drawn from the facts already adduced: “which of all the gods of the lands are they who have delivered their land out of my hand, that Jehovah should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?” i.e., as not one of the gods of the lands named have been able to rescue his land from Assyria, Jehovah also will not be able to defend Jerusalem.
2Ki_18:36-37
The people were quite silent at this address (“the people,” הָעָם, to whom Rabshakeh had wished to address himself); for Hezekiah had forbidden them to make any answer, not only to prevent Rabshakeh from saying anything further, but that the ambassadors of Sennacherib might be left in complete uncertainty as to the impression made by their words. The deputies of Hezekiah returned to the king with their clothes rent as a sign of grief at the words of the Assyrian, by which not only Hezekiah, but still more Jehovah, had been blasphemed, and reported what they had heard.
Monday, September 26, 2011
HEZEKIAH'S TUNNEL
Discovered in 1880 on the wall insidie Hezekiah's Tunnel the Siloam Inscript describes the final moments in the tunnel's excavation, when the two teams of tunnelers were near enough to each other to hear the picks of the opposite team through the rock. Both teams repeatedly changed directions toward the sound of the other and finally broke through "water (then) flowed from the spring to the pool," the Siloam Inscription tells us. The small changes in direction as the two teams of tunnelers sought to find each other at the meeting point can be seen below where the tunnel bends back and forth several times over the course of only a few feet. What has remained a mystery is how the tunnelers actually managed to reach that point. Expanding on the ideas of earlier explorer, , suggested by a geologist over a decade ago that the tunneler. Tunnel: rs were simply following and enlarging a natural underground stream, or karst. Why,when the two teams of tunnelers were so near, did they have to struggle to find the other, on the Siloam Inscription and the changes to direction near the meeting point tell us? And why, if they were following an underground stream, did they dig several false tunnels in the wrong direction
City of David. Once completed, the channel carried precious water from the Gihon spring just outside Jerusalem's city walls to the more protected confines of the Siloam Pool (See Plan). But working in near-total darkness with nothing more than small oil lamps and without the aid of intermediate surface shafts, how did the workers manage to find each other? And why did they follows such a circuitous route?
Planning for the worst in 701 B.C.E. the armies of the Assyrian monarch Sennarcherib descended upon the cities and villages of the kingdom of Judah. Although Sennacherib boasted in this famous cuneiform inscription, known as the Sennacherib Prism that he trapped Hezekiah in Jerusalem "like a bird in a cage," he ultimately failed to conquer Hezekiah's capital city. the failure of his siege of the city likely resulted from the defense measures Hezekiahs's defenses and building a tunnel that would secure the city's only source of water.
Saturday, September 24, 2011
RECIPES
- PREP TIME20 min
- TOTAL TIME1 hr 55 min
- SERVINGS32
Crust
- 1
- teaspoon instant espresso coffee granules
- 2
- teaspoons very hot water
- 1/2
- cup butter or margarine, softened
- 3/4
- cup sugar
- 1 1/4
- cups Gold Medal® all-purpose flour
- 3/4
- cup toffee bits (not chocolate covered)
Filling
- 1
- tablespoon instant espresso coffee granules
- 1
- tablespoon very hot water
- 2/3
- cup sweetened condensed milk (not evaporated)
- 1
- cup sugar
- 3
- eggs
- 2
- tablespoons Gold Medal® all-purpose flour
- 1/2
- teaspoon baking powder
- 1/4
- teaspoon salt
- Heat oven to 325°F. Grease bottom and sides of 13x9-inch pan with shortening or cooking spray; lightly flour. In small bowl, dissolve 1 teaspoon espresso in 2 teaspoons hot water. Add butter and 3/4 cup sugar; beat with electric mixer on medium speed until fluffy. On low speed, beat in 1 1/4 cups flour until blended. Press in pan.
- 2Sprinkle 1/2 cup of the toffee bits evenly over crust; press in slightly. Bake 15 to 17 minutes or until edges are light golden brown.
- 3In medium bowl, dissolve 1 tablespoon espresso in 1 tablespoon hot water. Add milk, 1 cup sugar and the eggs with electric mixer on medium speed until well blended. Stir in 2 tablespoons flour, the baking powder and salt. Pour over hot crust; spread evenly.
- 4Bake 28 to 33 minutes or until set. Immediately sprinkle with remaining 1/4 cup toffee bits. Cool completely in pan on cooling rack, about 1 hour. For bars, cut into 8 rows by 4 rows.
Friday, September 23, 2011
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Part II Hezekiah
Part II- Hezekiah
NECHUSHTAN
Hebrew word for snake or Serpent
The Israelites, like the inhabitants of Ulgarit, feared the lethal snakes so abundant both in the wilderness and in the land of Canaan. God's snake-related punishment recorded in Numbers 21:6-9 demonstrated that only the Lord has ultimate power over serpents (and indeed over all evil). Not only did he send venomous snakes to punish the Israelites because of their ingratitude, but he also provided the means of cure (i.e. the bronze snake) when his people repented and sought his mercy,. It is noteworthy that although the Israelites were required to gaze up at the bronze serpent in order to receive restoration,k the Biblical text mentions no magical ritual or incantation.
Num 21:4-9
March of Israel through the Arabah. Plague of Serpents, and Brazen Serpent. - Num_21:4. As the Edomites refused a passage through their land when the Israelites left Mount Hor, they were obliged to take the way to the Red Sea, in order to go round the land of Edom, that is to say, to go down the Arabah to the head of the Elanitic Gulf.
Num_21:5-6
As they went along this road the people became impatient (“the soul of the people was much discouraged,” see Exo_6:9), and they began once more to murmur against God and Moses, because they had neither bread nor water (cf. Num_20:4.), and were tired of the loose, i.e., poor, food of manna (קְלֹקֵל from קָלַל). The low-lying plain of the Arabah, which runs between steep mountain walls from the Dead Sea to the Red Sea, would be most likely to furnish the Israelites with very little food, except the manna which God gave them; for although it is not altogether destitute of vegetation, especially at the mouths of the wadys and winter torrents from the hills, yet on the whole it is a horrible desert, with a loose sandy soil, and drifts of granite and other stones, where terrible sand-storms sometimes arise from the neighbourhood of the Red Sea (see v. Schubert, R. ii. pp. 396ff., and Ritter, Erdk. xiv. pp. 1013ff.); and the want of food might very frequently be accompanied by the absence of drinkable water. The people rebelled in consequence, and were punished by the Lord with fiery serpents, the bite of which caused many to die. שְׂרָפִים נְחָשִׁים, lit., burning snakes, so called from their burning, i.e., inflammatory bite, which filled with heat and poison, just as many of the snakes were called by the Greeks, e.g., the äéøá́ò ðñçóôç͂ñåò, and καύσωνες (Dioscor. vii. 13: Aelian. nat. anim. vi. 51), not from the skin of these snakes with fiery red spots, which are frequently found in the Arabah, and are very poisonous.
(Note: This is the account given by v. Schubert, R. ii. p. 406: “In the afternoon they brought us a very mottled snake of a large size, marked with fiery red spots and wavy stripes, which belonged to the most poisonous species, as the formation of its teeth clearly showed. According to the assertion of the Bedouins, these snakes, which they greatly dreaded, were very common in that neighbourhood.”)
Num_21:7
This punishment brought the people to reflection. They confessed their sin to Moses, and entreated him to deliver them from the plague through his intercession with the Lord. And the Lord helped them; in such a way, however, that the reception of help was made to depend upon the faith of the people.
Num_21:8-9
At the command of God, Moses made a brazen serpent, and put it upon a standard.
(Note: For the different views held by early writers concerning the brazen serpent, see Buxtorf, historia serp. aen., in his Exercitt. pp. 458ff.; Deyling, observatt. ss. ii. obs. 15, pp. 156ff.; Vitringa, observ. ss. 1, pp. 403ff.; Jo. Marck, Scripturariae Exercitt. exerc. 8, pp. 465ff.; Iluth, Serpens exaltatus non contritoris sed conterendi imago, Erl. 1758; Gottfr. Menken on the brazen serpent; Sack, Apologetick, 2 Ausg. pp. 355ff. Hoffmann, Weissagung u. Erfüllung, ii. pp. 142, 143; Kurtz, History of the Old Covenant, iii. 345ff.; and the commentators on Joh_3:14 and Joh_3:15.)
Whoever then of the persons bitten by the poisonous serpents looked at the brazen serpent with faith in the promise of God, lived, i.e., recovered from the serpent's bite. The serpent was to be made of brass or copper, because the colour of this metal, when the sun was shining upon it, was most like the appearance of the fiery serpents; and thus the symbol would be more like the thing itself.
Even in the book of Wis. (Num_16:6-7), the brazen serpent is called “a symbol of salvation; for he that turned himself toward it was not saved by the thing that he saw, but by Thee, that art the Saviour of all.” It was not merely intended, however, as Ewald supposes (Gesch. ii. p. 228), as a “sign that just as this serpent hung suspended in the air, bound and rendered harmless by the command of Jehovah, so every one who looked at this with faith in the redeeming power of Jehovah, was secured against the evil, - a figurative sign, therefore, like that of St. George and the Dragon among ourselves;” for, according to this, there would be no internal causal link between the fiery serpents and the brazen image of a serpent. It was rather intended as a figurative representation of the poisonous serpents, rendered harmless by the mercy of God. For God did not cause a real serpent to be taken, but the image of a serpent, in which the fiery serpent was stiffened, as it were, into dead brass, as a sign that the deadly poison of the fiery serpents was overcome in this brazen serpent. This is not to be regarded as a symbol of the divine healing power; nor is the selection of such a symbol to be deduced and explained, as it is by Winer, Kurtz, Knobel, and others, from the symbolical view that was common to all the heathen religions of antiquity, that the serpent was a beneficent and health-bringing power, which led to its being exalted into a symbol of the healing power, and a representation of the gods of healing. This heathen view is not only foreign to the Old Testament, and without any foundation in the fact that, in the time of Hezekiah, the people paid a superstitious worship to the brazen serpent erected by Moses (2Ki_18:4); but it is irreconcilably opposed to the biblical view of the serpent, as the representative of evil, which was founded upon Gen_3:15, and is only traceable to the magical art of serpent-charming, which the Old Testament abhorred as an idolatrous abomination. To this we may add, that the thought which lies at the foundation of this explanation, viz., that poison is to be cured by poison, has no support in Hos_13:4, but is altogether foreign to the Scriptures. God punishes sin, it is true, by sin; but He neither cures sin by sin, nor death by death. On the contrary, to conquer sin it was necessary that the Redeemer should be without sin; and to take away its power from death, it was requisite that Christ, the Prince of life, who had life in Himself, should rise again from death and the grave (Joh_5:26; Joh_11:25; Act_3:15; 2Ti_1:10).
The brazen serpent became a symbol of salvation on the three grounds which Luther pointed out. In the first place, the serpent which Moses was to make by the command of God was to be of brass or copper, that is to say, of a reddish colour, and (although without poison) altogether like the persons who were red and burning with heat because of the bite of the fiery serpents. In the second place, the brazen serpent was to be set up upon a pole for a sign. And in the third place, those who desired to recover from the fiery serpent's bite and live, were to look at the brazen serpent upon the pole, otherwise they could not recover or live (Luther's Sermon on Joh_3:1-15). It was in these three points, as Luther has also clearly shown, that the typical character of this symbol lay, to which Christ referred in His conversation with Nicodemus (Joh_3:14). The brazen serpent had the form of a real serpent, but was “without poison, and altogether harmless.” So God sent His Son in the form of sinful flesh, and yet without sin (Rom_8:3; 2Co_5:21; 1Pe_2:22-24). - 2. In the lifting up of the serpent as a standard. This was a δειγματίζειν ἐν παρρησίᾳ, a èñéáìâåṍåéí (a “showing openly,” or “triumphing”), a triumphal exhibition of the poisonous serpents as put to death in the brazen image, just as the lifting up of Christ upon the cross was a public triumph over the evil principalities and powers below the sky (Col_2:14-15). - 3. In the cure effected through looking at the image of the serpent. Just as the Israelites had to turn their eyes to the brazen serpent in believing obedience to the word of the Lord, in order to be cured of the bite of the poisonous serpents, so much we look with faith at the Son of man lifted up upon the cross, if we would be delivered from the bite of the old serpent, from sin, death, the devil, and hell. “Christ is the antitype of the serpent, inasmuch as He took upon Himself the most pernicious of all pernicious potencies, viz., sin, and made a vicarious atonement for it” (Hengstenberg on Joh_3:14). The brazen image of the serpent was taken by the Israelites to Canaan, and preserved till the time of Hezekiah, who had it broken in pieces, because the idolatrous people had presented incense-offerings to this holy relic (2Ki_18:4).
Scholars have often speculated that Hezekiah destroyed the Nechushtan because it had come to be worshiped in the Temple and hence was as objectionable as the other cultic objects condemned in @ Kings 18:4 ( He removed the high places, demolished the sacred pillars, and tore down the Asherah poles. He also demolished the bronze serpent that Moses had crafted, because the Israelis had been burning incense to it right up until that time. Hezekiah called it a piece of brass ).
In the entire Deuteronomic History the Nechushtan is mentioned nowhere else except in the passage from 2 Kings. If this snake were really an image that had been worshiped in the Temple, we would expect it to be criticized by Deuteronomist.
A professor proposes a different explanation. proposes different explanation. She believes the destruction of the Nechushtan can best be understood in the context of the politcs of the time.
In the late 8th century B.C.E. Hezekiah was a vassal of Assyria, the superpower of the day. When Hezekiah joined a rebellion against Assyria (2 Kings 18:7 So the LORD was with him, and Hezekiah prospered wherever he went, even when he rebelled against the king of Assyria, refusing to serve ),the Assyrian ruler Sennacherib invaded Judah. According to the famous cuneiform prism of Sennacherihb, he conquered 46 fortified Judahite cities. The Bible admits as much 2 Kings 18:13( During the fourteenth year of the reign of King Hezekiah, King Sennacherib of Assyria approached all of the walled cities of Judah and seized them. ) we are told that Sennarcherib captured all the fortified Judahite cities and deported a part of the population. The Sennacherib prism states that he took prisoner 200,150 Israelites as well as horses, mule, camels and cattle
Monday, September 19, 2011
ARCHAEOLOGY DAY
Snakes wind along the sides of a silverplated standard dedicated to a snake goddess: the goddess is at center. The standard was discovered in a 14th century B.C.E. temple at Hazor, leading excavator to conclude that it was used as a ritual object.
Depictions of snakes were common in Eyptian culture and were meant to war off the danger of actual snakes. The feature of Egyptian life carried over into Israelite culture Numbers 21:4-9 records that God sent snakes to bite the Israelites, who had lamented that they had left Egypt and were stranded in the desert with miserable food to eat. To cure the Israelites of the bite, God ordered Moses to fashion the Nechushtan--a bronze serpent--and place it on a pole; any Israelite looking at the Nechushtan (which is simply the Hebrew word for "snake" or "serpent" would be cured.
So esteemed was the Nechushtan that after the Israelites settle in Canaan. It was place in the Jerusalem Temple. But centuries later the Nechushtan fell victim to King Hezekiah's religious reforms. Hezekiah (c.727-698 B.C.E.) destroyed various Canaanite relious objects, including bamot (high places) matzevot (sacret pillars) and the asherah(sacred post); he also smashed the Nechushtan.
A snake for protection rises from the forehead of the golden burial mast of Psusennes 1 (1039-991 B.C.E., the third king of the 21 Dynasty. the Uraeus, an Egyptian symbol of royalty worn on the headdress of pharaohs and deities, acted as a safeguard. On a diadem, it protected the pharaoh from his enemies; on an amulet it shilded its wearer from other snakes.
Recognizing the Egyptian origins of the snake symbol, the accompanying article argues, helps us understand King Hezekiah's motive in destroying the Nechustan in the Jerusalem Temple. Hezekiah's act came in the wake of Assyria's devastating attack on Judah in the late eighth century B.C.E., an onslaught that left Hezekiah greatly weakened and which forced him to payh tribute to Assyria. The destruction of the Nechustan, and also the abandonment of the winged symbols on royal jar handles in favor of rosettes, an Assyrian symbol are now understandable; Hezekiah and the kings of Judah who followed him were demonstrating their loyalty to Assyria by destroying symbols that came from Egypt, Assyria's long time enemy.
THE TIMNA SERPENT was discovered in a 13rth or 12th century B.C.E. temple at Timna in southern Israel. This copper snake with its gilded head stretches 5 inches and evokes the Biblical Nechushtan
Friday, September 16, 2011
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Part 1
Hezekiah
(חזקיּה, ḥizḳı̄yāh, “Yahweh has strengthened”; also written חזקיּהוּ, ḥı̄zḳı̄yāhū, “Yah has strengthened him”; Ἑζεκίας, Hezekı́as): One of the greatest of the kings of Judah; reigned (according to the most self-consistent chronology) from circa 715 to circa 690 bc.
Old Testament Estimate
On the Old Testament standard of loyalty to Yahweh he is eulogized by Jesus Sirach
(This Jesus was the son of Sirach, and grandchild to Jesus of the same name with him: this man therefore lived in the latter times, after the people had been led away captive, and called home a again, and almost after all the prophets. Now his grandfather Jesus, as he himself witnesseth, was a man of great diligence and wisdom among the Hebrews, who did not only gather the grave and short sentences of wise men, that had been before him, but himself also uttered some of his own, full of much understanding and wisdom. When as therefore the first Jesus died, leaving this book almost perfected, Sirach his son receiving it after him left it to his own son Jesus, who, having gotten it into his hands, compiled it all orderly into one volume, and called it Wisdom, intituling it both by his own name, his father’s name, and his grandfather’s; alluring the hearer by the very name of Wisdom to have a greater love to the study of this book. It containeth therefore wise sayings, dark sentences, and parables, and certain particular ancient godly stories of men that pleased God; also his prayer and song; moreover, what benefits God had vouchsafed his people, and what plagues he had heaped upon their enemies. This Jesus did imitate Solomon, and was no less famous for wisdom and learning, both being indeed a man of great learning, and so reputed also.
The Prologue of the Wisdom of Jesus the Son of Sirach.
Whereas many and great things have been delivered unto us by the law and the prophets, and by others that have followed their steps, for the which things Israel ought to be commended for learning and wisdom; and whereof not only the readers must needs become skilful themselves, but also they that desire to learn be able to profit them which are without, both by speaking and writing: my grandfather Jesus, when he had much given himself to the reading of the law, and the prophets, and other books of our fathers, and had gotten therein good judgment, was drawn on also himself to write something pertaining to learning and wisdom; to the intent that those which are desirous to learn, and are addicted to these things, might profit much more in living according to the law. Wherefore let me intreat you to read it with favour and attention, and to pardon us, wherein we may seem to come short of some words, which we have laboured to interpret. For the same things uttered in Hebrew, and translated into another tongue, have not the same force in them: and not only these things, but the law itself, and the prophets, and the rest of the books, have no small difference, when they are spoken in their own language. For in the eight and thirtieth year coming into Egypt, when Euergetes was king, and continuing there some time, I found a book of no small learning: therefore I thought it most necessary for me to bestow some diligence and travail to interpret it; using great watchfulness and skill in that space to bring the book to an end, and set it forth for them also, which in a strange country are willing to learn, being prepared before in manners to live after the law)
as one of the three kings who alone did not “commit trespass” (Sirach 49:4
Sir.49
[1] The memory of Josiah is like a blending of incense
prepared by the art of the perfumer;
it is sweet as honey to every mouth,
and like music at a banquet of wine.
[2] He was led aright in converting the people,
and took away the abominations of iniquity.
[3] He set his heart upon the Lord;
in the days of wicked men he strengthened godliness.
[4] Except David and Hezekiah and Josiah
they all sinned greatly,
for they forsook the law of the Most High;
the kings of Judah came to an end;
[5] for they gave their power to others,
and their glory to a foreign nation,
[6] who set fire to the chosen city of the sanctuary,
and made her streets desolate,
according to the word of Jeremiah.
[7] For they had afflicted him;
yet he had been consecrated in the womb as prophet,
to pluck up and afflict and destroy,
and likewise to build and to plant.
[8] It was Ezekiel who saw the vision of glory
which God showed him above the chariot of the cherubim.
[9] For God remembered his enemies with storm,
and did good to those who directed their ways aright.
[10] May the bones of the twelve prophets
revive from where they lie,
for they comforted the people of Jacob
and delivered them with confident hope.
[11] How shall we magnify Zerubbabel?
He was like a signet on the right hand,
[12] and so was Jeshua the son of Jozadak;
in their days they built the house
and raised a temple holy to the Lord,
prepared for everlasting glory.
[13] The memory of Nehemiah also is lasting;
he raised for us the walls that had fallen,
and set up the gates and bars
and rebuilt our ruined houses.
[14] No one like Enoch has been created on earth,
for he was taken up from the earth.
[15] And no man like Joseph has been born,
and his bones are cared for.
[16] Shem and Seth were honored among men,
and Adam above every living being in the creation.
the other two being David and Josiah. The Chronicler represents him (2Ch_32:31
Later on, envoys came from the princes of Babylon to inquire about the miracle that had happened in the land. God left Hezekiah to himself, so that he might make known what was really in Hezekiah's heart.
) as lapsing from the wisdom of piety only by his vainglory in revealing the resources of his realm to the envoys of Merodach-baladan. Merodach-Baladan
mḗ-rō´dak-bal´a-dan, mer´ṓ-dak-b. (בּלאדן מראדך, mero'dhakh bal'ădhān; Μαρωδὰχ Βαλαδάν, Marōdách Baladán): The son of Baladan, is mentioned in Isa_39:1, as a king of Babylon who sent an embassy to Hezekiah, king of Judah, apparently shortly after the latter's illness, in order to congratulate him on his recovery of health, and to make with him an offensive and defensive alliance. This Merodach-baladan was a king of the Chaldeans of the house of Yakin, and was the most dangerous and inveterate foe of Sargon and his son Sennacherib, kings of Assyria, with whom he long and bitterly contested the possession of Babylon and the surrounding provinces. Merodach-Baladan seems to have seized Babylon immediately after the death of Shalmaneser in 721 BC; and it was not till the 12th year of his reign that Sargon succeeded in ousting him. From that time down to the 8th campaign of Sennacherib, Sargon and his son pursued with relentless animosity Merodach-Baladan and his family until at last his son Nabushumishkun was captured and the whole family of Merodach-Baladan was apparently destroyed. According to the monuments, therefore, it was from a worldly point of view good politics for Hezekiah and his western allies to come to an understanding with Merodach-Baladan and the Arameans, Elamites, and others, who were confederated with him. From a strategical point of view, the weakness of the allied powers consisted in the fact that the Arabian desert lay between the eastern and western members of the confederacy, so that the Assyrian kings were able to attack their enemies when they pleased and to defeat them in detail.
In 2Ki_18: He trusted the LORD God of Israel, and after him there were none like him among all the kings of Judah 5, the earliest estimate, his special distinction, beyond all other Judean kings, before or after, was that he “trusted in Yahweh, the God of Israel.” It is as the king who “clave to Yahweh” (2Ki_18:6 because he depended on the LORD, not abandoning pursuit of him, and keeping the LORD's commands that he had commanded Moses.) that the Hebrew mind sums up his royal and personal character.
Monday, September 12, 2011
ARCHAEOLOGY DAY
Above shows a jar handle impressed with the word l'melekh ["(belonging) to the king"] and a two-winged sun disk. More than 2,000 l'melekh handles have been uncovered in excavations in Israel, all dating to the reign of Hezekiah. The symbols on Hezekiah's seal and on the jar handles are Egyptian and show the cultural and political influence Egypt exerted over Judah
THE SEAL OF THE KING HEZEKIAH, depicted on the bulla at for (an impressed lump of clay), is one of the two seals belonging to Judahite kings that have been recovered.
Read more on Hezekiah on Wednesday
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