Melakhim B 18-19: Sancheriv's Seige of Jerusalem
SEFER MELAKHIM
BET: THE SECOND
BOOK OF KINGS
By Rav Alex Israel
Shiur #23: Chapters 18-19 – Sancheriv’s Siege
of Jerusalem
Last shiur we
discussed Chizkiyahu's rise to power. We noted his devotion to God and we
charted his initial accomplishments: his repudiation of his father's idolatry,
his nationwide campaign to expunge pagan worship from the kingdom, the
purification and reopening of the Temple and his ambitious strategy to reunify
the northern and southern kingdoms. We recall that this last aspiration
materialized in a grand, national celebration of Pesach at the Temple in
Jerusalem.
The subsequent story of
Chizkiyahu is narrated through three dramatic episodes:
1. 18:13-19:37 The Assyrian
attack on Jerusalem
2. 20:1-11
Chizkiyahu's sickness
3. 20:12-19
The diplomatic visit of Berodakh Baladan from Bavel
Despite some question as to the correct
chronology[1] of these three
independent literary segments, we shall study each story according to the order
that it features in Sefer Melakhim.
YEHUDA ATTACKED
Despite Chizkiyahu's
smooth and strident religious beginnings, the international environment quickly
becomes complicated and perilous. In Chizkiyahu's fourth year, Shomron is
besieged by Ashur, and in his sixth year Shomron falls (18:9-12). The powerful
Assyrian empire is the dominant regional force; clearly Chizkiyahu should
exercise caution. And yet, we read how “he rebelled against the king of Ashur
and would not serve him. He overran Peleshet as far as Azza and its border
areas…” (18:7-8). What prompted Chizkiyahu to challenge Ashur?
Chizkiyahu's insurgency incites Ashur to
attack the southern kingdom and to lay siege against Jerusalem. The devastation
wrought by Sancheriv is unprecedented. Forty-six walled cities – “all the
fortified cities of Yehuda” (18:13)[2] are attacked and
defeated,[3] including the
impressive fortress city of Lakhish (18:14),[4] second in
strength only to Jerusalem. The victorious Assyrian war machine then marches
against Jerusalem and besieges it. Yeshayahu depicts the capital city,
vulnerable and lonely, as a “hut in a vineyard” (Yeshayahu 1:8), an
unsteady, flimsy structure, surrounded by a land laid waste by war.
"Your land is a waste
Your cities burnt down;
Before your eyes, the yield of your soil
Is consumed by strangers -
A wasteland; like Sodom overthrown.
And Zion is left
Like a hut in a vineyard
As a hut in a field,
Like a city beleaguered." (Yishayahu 1:7-8)[5]
This
imagery drives home the question with greater veracity. Why did Chizkiyahu
provoke Ashur? Was he not aware of the ruinous consequences that he was bringing
upon his kingdom?
In order to answer this
question, we would do well to understand the historical background to the
period.
FROM SARGON TO SANCHERIV
The Assyrian king Sargon
II (722-705 BCE) was known as a cruel and determined ruler. It is likely that
this king started his reign by presiding over the despoiling and exile of
Shomron.[6] Notwithstanding
the distastefulness of being vassal to Ashur and the substantial annual tribute
to its king, Chizkiyahu appreciated that to throw off the Assyrian yoke meant
courting disaster.[7] But in 705 BCE
Sargon was killed in battle. His body was never found, and he was not given a
royal burial. The death of an emperor always presented an opportunity for
revolt, but the circumstances of Sargon’s death, widely seen as a bad omen for
Ashur, exacerbated the unrest. Rebellion broke out at both extremities of the
sprawling empire. In Bavel, Merodakh Baladan crowned himself as ruler. In the
south, Yehuda allied itself with Peleshet and Egypt in rejecting Assyrian power.
Since Melakhim records that Merodakh Baladan visited Chizkiyahu
(20:12-13), we may suggest that the resistances in the East and West were
coordinated. We can appreciate that for Chizkiyahu, the death of Sargon seemed
the opportune moment, after two decades, to overthrow foreign domination. For four years, Chizkiyahu prepares
assiduously for war. He carves a magnificent water tunnel through the bedrock,[8] a marvel of
ancient engineering, rerouting the waters of the Gichon spring away from the
exposed outer wall of the city, into the center of Jerusalem.[9]
The city walls are raised and fortified,
arms and foodstuffs are stockpiled,[10] the army
trained.
And yet, Sancheriv fights
back. In 703-702 BCE he puts an end to the Babylonian revolt. In 701 BCE he
invades Judea, crushing the rebellion. He defeats the Egyptian and Ethiopian
forces and then sends his army to besiege Jerusalem.
Initially, Chizkiyahu
attempts to bribe Sancheriv:
Chizkiyahu, king of Yehuda, sent this message to the king of Ashur at Lakhish:
“I have done wrong. Leave me, and I will pay whatever tribute you impose on me.”
The king of Ashur exacted three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of
gold from Chizkiyahu, king of Yehuda.[11]
Chizkiyahu paid him all the funds there were in the Temple of the Lord and in
the palace treasuries. At that time, Chizkiyahu cut the doors of the Temple of
the Lord which King Chizkiyahu had overlaid with gold, and gave them to the king
of Ashur. (18:14-16)
Despite Chizkiyahu's remorse and the extensive
bribe, no response is heard from the king of Ashur. Instead, the narrative turns
to an expansive dramatic enactment of Sancheriv's official delegation to
Jerusalem.
THE STORY IN MELAKHIM
We have described the
political and military background to the Assyrian siege, a campaign which
threatened the very existence of Yehuda. And yet, Sefer Melakhim adopts
an entirely different angle to narrate this drama, presenting the military
attack and the political negotiations as a religious and theological drama, more
a verbal offensive than a military attack, as it transforms Sancheriv's
aggression and Chizkiyahu's defense into a discourse about man's hubris or his
reliance on God, as well as a direct test of God's power.
The central drama is
expressed in the speech of Rav-shakeh, the Assyrian official who leads
Sancheriv's heavily armed force to Jerusalem. It is a dramatic standoff, as
three Assyrian high officials[12]
confront three senior Israelite government figures.[13] The speech seems aimed at evincing
surrender on the part of the city:
Rav-shakeh said to them: “You tell Chizkiyahu: Thus said the Great King,
the King of Ashur: ‘What is
the security [bitachon] on which you have relied [batachta]?…
on whom are you relying [batachta], that you have rebelled against me?
You rely [batahta] on Egypt, that splintered reed of a staff, which
enters and punctures the palm of anyone who leans on it! That's what Pharaoh,
king of Egypt, is like to all who rely on him. And if you tell me that you are
relying [batachnu] on the Lord your God, He is the very one whose shrines
and altars Chizkiyahu removed… do you think I have marched against this land to
destroy it without God? God Himself told me: Go up against that land and destroy
it.’” (18:19-25)
Rav-shakeh's arrogance and disdain is apparent
as he addresses Chizkiyahu devoid of a royal title, in contrast to Sancheriv,
“the Great King.” His speech, ostensibly directed to Chizkiyahu, is in reality
an exercise of mockery, demoralization and intimidation aimed at the common
people of Jerusalem, suffering from scarcity of food in the lengthy siege, who
mass on the wall to hear the enemy speak. This is evidenced by the following
exchange:
Elyakim son of Chilkiya, Shevna and Yoach replied to Rav-shakeh:
“Please! Speak to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it; do not speak
to us in Judean in the earshot of the people on the wall.” But Rav-shakeh
answered them, “Was it to your master and to you that my master sent me to speak
those words? It was precisely to the men who are sitting on the wall – who will
have to eat their dung and drink their urine…” (26-27)
The royal edict (18:36)
that forbids the common people to respond or react to the Assyrian provocation
gives us an appreciation of the psychological impact of this exchange. The issue
is not whether the starving Jerusalemites will be shaken, but that their
reactions to the taunts of Rav-shakeh not convey an impression that may
galvanize the Assyrians to greater confidence. It is critical that Jerusalem
retain its stoic face. Let us make no mistake that this is a war of words in the
most literal sense.
When we read Rav-shakeh's
speech, we cannot help but notice the sevenfold repetition of the verb
betach; the central issue relates to “bitachon” – one's source of
fortitude or strength. Upon whom do we depend? From where do we draw confidence
and strength? Here Rav-shakeh raises two possibilities. First, it may be that
Israel is relying on Egypt. Rav-shakeh responds that Egypt will fail to support
them.[14] Like a Nile
reed, when Israel leans on it it will simply pierce their hand. The second
source of strength, Rav-shakeh suggests, is God. This too he debunks, claiming
that it was God who had sent Sancheriv against Jerusalem, and that God was angry
with Chizkiyahu.
In Rav-shakeh’s second
speech, he again appeals to the people of Jerusalem, ignoring Elyakim's request
that he speak Aramaic rather than “Judean.” Rav-shakeh is basking in the
intimidation he is wreaking against the besieged Israelites, grandstanding to
the assembled throngs “in a loud Judean voice” (18:28). Now a new leitwort features: “hatzel”
– indicative of salvation, deliverance or rescue. He undercuts the king – “Don't
listen to Chizkiyahu” – and he continues with his smug oratory, seeking to
convey that the people will be much better off under Assyrian rule:
Don't let Chizkiyahu deceive you, for he will not be able to save (le-hatzil)
you from my hands. Don't let Chizkiyahu make you rely (yavtach) on God,
saying: “God will surely save (hatzel yatzilenu) us – this city will not
fall into the hands of the king of Ashur.” Don't listen to Chizkiyahu. For thus
said the king of Ashur: “Make your peace with me and come out to me, so that you
may all eat from your vines and your fig trees and drink water from your
cisterns, until I come and take you away to a land like your own, a land of
grain and vineyards, of bread and wine, of olive oil and honey, so that you may
live and not die.” Don't listen to Chizkiyahu, who misleads you by saying, “God
will save (yatzilenu) us.” Did any of the gods of other nations save (hahatzel
hitzilu) his land from the king of Ashur?… Did they save Shomron (hitzilu)
from me?… Will God save (yatzil) Jerusalem from my hand?
Rav-shakeh's words aspire to entice the
trapped population. Sancheriv will save them; they can abandon Jerusalem and
return to their farms and villages. Echoing the language of Sefer Devarim,
he promises to transport them to “a land of grain and vineyards, of bread and
wine, of olive oil and honey” (parallel to Devarim 8:7-8). His rhetoric
also recalls the peace of Shlomo’s era: “each man sitting under his vine and fig
tree” (parallel to Melakhim I 5:5). But after promising Assyrian
salvation, the rhetoric returns to God, as Rav-shakeh profanely disparages God,
mocking His incapability to save His people.
Sefer Melakhim quotes Rav-shakeh's
lengthy and provocative speech verbatim.[15] We might
question the necessity of expansively presenting the offensive taunts of
Israel's enemy. The goal, it seems, is to accentuate the Assyrian smugness on
the one hand, and their blasphemy on the other.[16]
For now the
battle will escalate a notch. The
Assyrian king's challenge has attracted a new adversary. The chief
antagonist Sancheriv and his army will now be forced to contend with a divine
protagonist. Furthermore, Sancheriv's conceited braggadocio will be a stark
contrast to Chizkiyahu's earnest and humble appeal to God.
CHIZKIYAHU'S APPEAL TO GOD
Chizkiyahu's men return
with torn clothes, a sign of mourning[17] and crisis.[18] Chizkiyahu
responds by appealing directly to God. He does this in two ways. First,
Chizkiyahu too tears his clothes, dons sackcloth and ascends to the Temple to
pray. He then immediately sends his delegation (also now in sackcloth) to
consult with the prophet Yeshayahu:
This day is a day of distress[19]
and rebuke and disgrace! The children have come to birth-stool and there is no
strength to give birth. Perhaps the Lord your God will take note of the words of
Rav-shakeh whom his master, the king of Ashur. has sent to blaspheme the living
God…
(19:3-4)
The metaphor of childbirth is a powerful one,
as the Radak explains:
Like a woman in the throes of agony of childbirth as the baby is about
to emerge… And the pain is greatest; if the midwife has no strength to extract
the baby, [the mother] is abandoned to the intensity of the pains of childbirth
without any hope of relief. Similarly, the great crisis is upon us and we lack
the strength to escape it if God will not assist us.
The plight of Jerusalem
seemed desperate. All the neighboring states, partners in Chizkiyahu's alliance
against Assyria, had surrendered or were crushed. Egyptian aid had proved
worthless, the country was overrun by the enemy, and now Jerusalem is alone and
besieged. In his helplessness Chizkiyahu understands that he can rely only on
God, and he casts the future of his capital city and his kingdom at God's door.
GOD'S RESPONSE
Yeshayahu answers
Chizkiyahu's messengers at the moment they arrive:
Thus says the Lord: “Do not be frightened by the words of blasphemy
against Me that you have heard from the minions of the king of Ashur. I will put
a spirit in him; he will hear a rumor and return to his land and I will make him
fall by the sword. (19:7-8)
And so it happens. Almost
immediately, Rav-shakeh calls off the attack as the army must relocate due to a
pressing military crisis in another location. Nonetheless, a second Assyrian
assault follows swiftly, with further blasphemous rhetoric. Once again,
Chizkiyahu's recourse is a purely religious one. He takes the offensive Assyrian
letter and spreads it before him in the Temple as if to force God to confront
the abuse and insult being hurled at Him. He then prays, and the text of that
prayer is a classic formulation of direct appeal to God from the depths of
distress. (Nowadays many of the phrases are incorporated in our Tachanun
liturgy.)
God accepts the king's
appeal. Although God responds to Chizkiyahu through the prophet Yeshayahu, it is
implied that he is speaking directly to Sancheriv:
Have you not heard? Long ago, I ordained it. In days of old I planned it;
now I have brought it to pass, that you have turned fortified cities into piles
of stone. Their people, drained of power, are dismayed and put to shame.
But I know where you are,
and when you come and go,
and how you rage against Me.
Because you rage against Me,
and because your insolence has
reached My ears,
I will put my hook in your nose,
and My bit in your mouth,
and I will make you return by
the way you came.
(19:25-28)
God uses Sancheriv's argument. Sancheriv claims that he is
God's messenger. God affirms that very fact. But, says God, Sancheriv has abused
his power; he has profaned the God that empowered him, and now he will be
demoted and treated as a slave, a mere horse, with a hook in his nose and a bit
in his mouth. God is firmly in control.
As for the current siege on Jerusalem, Yeshayahu assures Chizkiyahu that
not even a single shot will be fired. It will be over sooner than anyone
anticipates“Therefore this is what the
Lord says concerning the king of Assyria:
'He will not enter this city
or shoot an arrow here.
He will not come before it with shield
or build a siege ramp against it.
By the way that he came he will return;
he will not enter this city,'
declares the
Lord.
'I will defend this city and save it,
for my sake and for the sake of David my
servant.'”(19:32-34)
This must have
seemed quite improbable, even absurd. But it is fulfilled that very night:
That night an angel of God went out and put to death a hundred
and eighty-five thousand in the Assyrian camp. And the following morning they
were all dead corpses. (19:35)
The final prophecy of the chapter points to
Sancheriv's assassination at the hands of his own sons and the Tanakh records
the realization of that prophecy. We now possess the Assyrian annals of
Esar-haddon which report that this was precisely how Sancheriv died, albeit,
some twenty years hence in 681 BCE.
HISTORICAL AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL REFERENCES
For centuries, this
remarkable miracle seemed unsubstantiated by any external source. It almost
seems too fantastical to imagine a huge army of 185,000 just expiring in their
sleep. The Biblical account aroused skepticism. The Greek historian Herodotus
(485-425 BCE) reported a similar story, although there the adversary is Egypt.
In that account, field mice
invaded the Assyrian camp and gnawed the quivers, bow strings, and leather
shield handles, thus disarming the military force. As a consequence, many of the
soldiers were killed and others fled. Josephus too reports the miracle of
Jerusalem's reprieve in the days of Chizkiyahu, ascribing the death of the
Assyrian troops to a devastating plague (Antiquities X:21-23). These sources
notwithstanding, there was little to verify the Biblical version of the events.
However, with the discovery of Sancheriv's own records (see footnote 2) almost
two centuries ago, we have greater backing for the veracity of the story
described by Sefer Melakhim. Sancheriv's war records demonstrate a strange
anomaly at the siege on Jerusalem. As Prof. Haim Tadmor[20] has observed,[21] Sancheriv’s
annals use a standardized formula when describing the conquest of an enemy town:
“Four elements which constitute a fixed structure, without which one cannot
speak of a description of battle against a renegade enemy.” The four elements
are how Sancheriv: 1. conquered a kingdom (including the capital city); 2.
killed the king; 3. appointed his own vassal in place of the former king; and 4.
imposed a heavy taxation. These are fixtures in recording every one of
Sancheriv’s conquests except one – the war against Jerusalem in 701 BCE.
Sancheriv describes the siege and Chizkiyahu's tribute, but fails to record the
fall of Jerusalem and the execution or incarceration of its king.[22] This leads Prof.
Tadmor to assume that Sancheriv abandoned his siege, failing to vanquish the
city. What could explain the failure of the world's most devastating military
source?
Sancheriv’s annals yield other gems which corroborate and enrich our
reading of the account in Tanakh. One particular phrase sheds some light upon an
unusual metaphor in the book of Yishayahu. Sancheriv, in his own words, boasts:
“[Chizkiyahu] himself, like a caged bird I shut up in Jerusalem, his royal
city.” This may explain the
language of Yeshayahu's prophecy: “Like birds
in flight, so will the God of Hosts
protect Jerusalem; He will protect and deliver it; He will spare and rescue it”
(Yeshayahu 31:5).
Until this Assyrian
document was uncovered, we didn't appreciate the significance of Yeshayahu's
language. Now we realize that Yeshayahu's phraseology was a direct retort to the
language of Sancheriv. We see now that the discovery of Sancheriv’s annals has
added historical veracity to this episode and has contributed to our
understanding of the events described in Tanakh.
HISTORIC IMPACT
An interesting criticism of Chizkiyahu can be found in the Gemara:
The Holy One, blessed be He, wished to appoint Chizkiyahu as the Messiah and
Sancheriv as Gog and Magog. The Attribute of Justice said before the Holy One,
blessed be He: “Sovereign of the Universe! If You did not make David the
Messiah, who uttered so many hymns and psalms before You, will You then appoint
Chizkiyahu as such, who did not praise You despite all these miracles which You
performed
for him?”
(Sanhedrin 94a)
If one places this state
of affairs into perspective – the world's most destructive military attacks
Jerusalem, the city is on the verge of annihilation, and then suddenly and
unexpectedly is saved by a miracle – one's mind cannot help but be drawn to
similar eschatological scenarios elsewhere in Tanakh. One of the prime examples
of this paradigm is the vision of Gog and Magog (see Yechezkel 38-39 and
specifically 39:21-23), which depicts Gog gathering forces to decimate Israel,
and then God's salvation. In the Talmudic passage quoted above, Chazal
suggest that this war had the potential to be the messianic moment, the war to
end all wars. A devastating war leader of Sancheriv's power and force, a man who
had conquered all civilization fulfills the character description of Gog. The
supernatural death of the enemy forces matched God's role in the messianic
vision. All that was left was for Chizkiyahu to recognize God's guiding hand in
the victory. But somehow, Chizkiyahu failed to channel this moment into a
religious trajectory. In his distress, Chizkiyahu desperately turned to God; in
victory, he failed to respond with praise to the Almighty. We wonder why this
happened. We might offer one suggestion: Despite Jerusalem's reprieve, the
entire landscape of Yehuda remained war-torn, tens of thousands of captives had
been taken by Sancheriv, and cities were burnt and destroyed with heavy
casualties. To Chizkiyahu, this may not have felt like a moment of jubilation.[23]
We shall have to examine
the roots of this rabbinic statement in our upcoming shiur, but for now,
let us be impressed by the Talmud's assertion that this event powerfully evokes
messianic allusions.[24] This deliverance was beyond any
expectation – no superlative could contain it. As such, this miraculous victory
over Ashur made a colossal impression upon our national psyche: “The kings of
the earth did not believe, nor did any of the peoples of the world, that enemies
and foes could enter the gates of Jerusalem” (Eikha 4:10).
When the Temple was
eventually destroyed, kings and commoners alike were astonished. They simply
failed to comprehend that Jerusalem could fall. Why? Because the victory against
Sancheriv had evinced the belief that Jerusalem was under divine protection –
that it was invincible.
Similarly, Yirmyahu seeks to persuade the people of
Jerusalem to stop believing blindly that the Temple is fundamentally
indestructible, that God would never destroy his Temple. He tries to prove his
point from the destruction, some four hundred years earlier, of the mishkan
in Shilo, but to no avail (Yirmiyahu 7). Ironically, the wondrous miracle
of Jerusalem's rescue from Sancheriv's attack made it harder in subsequent
generations for anyone to believe the prophet when he warned about the impending
demise of the city. The people recalled God’s promise –
“I
will defend this city and save it, for My sake and for the sake of David My
servant” (19:34)
[1]
We shall address some
of the chronological issues in our upcoming chapter. For now, let us note a
significant disparity between the timeline in Tanakh and the Assyrian timeline,
adopted by historians. Shomron falls in Chizkiyahu's sixth year. Historians date
this event to 722 BCE. But the siege in Jerusalem is dated to 701 BCE, some
twenty-one years later. This is problematic because Melakhim,
Yeshayahu and Divrei Ha-yamim all agree that the siege occurred in
the fourteenth year of Chizkiyahu's reign. It is difficult to resolve these
dates. The Olam Ha-Tanakh commentary suggests that the fourteen years
must be dated to another event. Rav Yoel Bin Nun and Rav Binyamin Lau, in their
recent volume on Yeshayahu (see p.195-6), propose that Chizkiyahu was crowned
over all Israel in his eleventh year at the celebratory Pesach celebration.
Thus, the fourteenth year is marked from the second coronation and coincides
with Chizkiyahu's twenty-fifth year. Despite the scant textual support for this
approach, it succeeds in resolving the disparity.
[2]
The Assyrian attack
on Jerusalem is one of the most extensively documented events in Biblical
history. Beyond the Biblical account (recorded in Melakhim, Yishayahu,
Mikha, and Divrei Ha-yamim), there are a wealth of archeological
and Assyrian records that verify, enrich, and sometimes challenge aspects of the
Biblical account. The statistic of 46 cities is recorded in
SennacheribSancheriv's own annals which document his war prowess, written in
cuneiform on a baked terracotta prism, just 38cm in height, discovered in
ancient Nineveh. Three identical clay prisms
have been discovered inscribed with the same text: the Jerusalem Prism in the Israel Museum, the Taylor Prism (discovered 1830 -
British Museum) and the Oriental
Institute Prism (Chicago.) We
shall discuss some of the text of these Assyrian texts at the end of this
chapter.
[4]
Sancheriv's throne room in Nineveh was decorated with an incredibly elaborate
and detailed relief, in thirteen huge panels, depicting the siege, attack and
eventual fall and enslavement of Lakhish. It is evident that this victory was a
significant mark of pride for Sancheriv and it is fascinating to see how a small
province such as Judea could muster such significant opposition to a colossal
empire like Assyria. When Lakhish was excavated in 1932-1938, the defenses and
attack ramps were found to match the Sancheriv relief quite accurately.
[5]
There is some debate as to the precise events depicted in Yeshayahu 1-5.
Here we follow the approach of Da’at Mikra, who sees these chapters as a
description of Chizkiyahu’s reign.
[6]
The Tanakh describes
Shalmanesser as besieging and vanquishing Shomron (18:9). But Assyrian records
chart Sargon II as responsible for exiling its inhabitants. The final fall of
Shomron probably transpired around the time of Shalmanesser’s death and the
ascent to the throne of Sargon. This may be hinted at by the mention of an
anonymous “king” in 18:11, rather than an explicit reference to Shalmanesser.
[7] An insurrection was attempted by Azuri,
the king of Ashdod, in 711 BCE. The catalyst for this revolt appears to have
been shifts in power in the Egyptian government, changes that led regional
states to believe that Egypt would have the strength to protect them and
actively resist Ashur. On the basis of Yeshayahu 20, it is likely that
Chizkiyahu contemplated joining the rebellion. Yeshayahu warns against this
alliance. In this regard, Assyrian records document a conspiracy of
“the kings of Philistia, Judah, Edom, Moab.” If Chizkiyahu indeed joined
the revolt at all, he seems to have adopted Yeshayahu’s advice and withdrawn in
time, as Ashdod and Peleshet were devastated under the orders of Sargon's
official Taratan, whereas Yehuda escaped unscathed.
[8]
No tour of the “City of David” is
complete without sloshing, flashlight in hand, through “Chizkiyahu's Tunnel,”
which winds for 533 meters deep in the bedrock with only a 30 cm. (0.6%)
gradient. A tablet written in ancient Hebrew script, now housed at the Istanbul
archaeology museum in Turkey, records the method of construction, in which teams
started from opposite ends and met at the middle! Recently there has been some
debate as to the period in which the tunnel was constructed. See
R. Reich and E. Shukron, “The Date of the Siloam
Tunnel Reconsidered,” Tel Aviv 38 (2011), pp. 147–157 and H. Shanks,
“Will King
Chizkiyahu Be Dislodged from His Tunnel?”
Biblical Archaeology Review,
September/October 2013.
[9]
See Melakhim II 20:20, Yeshayahu 22:10 and Divrei Ha-yamim
II 32:3. For the assessment of the four-year duration, the death of Sargon II
took place in 705 BCE, while the Assyrian attack occurred in 701 BCE. See also
A. Sneh, E. Shalev and R. Weinberger, “The Why, How, and When of the Siloam
Tunnel Reevaluated,”
Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental
Research 359 (2010), pp. 57–65.
[10]
Excavations in
Lakhish demonstrate an unusually large concentration of handles from earthenware
storage jars stamped with a “la-melekh” (belonging to the king) seal
indicative of their status as royal property. These are dated to the period of
Chizkiyahu. One theory explaining this phenomenon suggests a stockpiling of food
to withstand an extensive siege.
[11]
Sancheriv's annals testify that
Chizkiyahu paid “30 talents of
gold, 800 talents of silver, precious stones, antimony, large cuts of red stone,
couches inlaid with ivory, nimedu-chairs inlaid with ivory, elephant hides,
ebony wood, boxwood and all kinds of valuable treasures, his own daughters and
concubines.” This is a more generous bribe than mentioned in Melakhim.
But it is highly possible that in light of his defeat at Jerusalem, Sancheriv
made the bribe look more attractive to save face.
[12]
These were the
Taratan (military commander and deputy to the king), the Rav-saris
(chief official, lit. “head eunuch”) and the Rav-shakeh (lit. head wine
butler). Rav-shakeh may be a title for a central government position.
Alternatively, he may actually be of lower official stature, but functions as
the spokesman for the group because he speaks Hebrew.
[13]
Elyakim ben Chilkiya “over the
house”, Shevna the “sofer” and Yoach ben Asaf, the “mazkir.” See Shmuel II 8:16-18, 20:23-25,
Melakhim
I 4:1-5, 18:3. We don't know with any certainty the precise functions of these
government positions. The character of Shevna is intriguing.
Isaiah
22 depicts a situation during the siege of Jerusalem in which the city is
enthralled by a carefree celebratory atmosphere: "Why have you gone up to the housetops?
Celebration, a tumultuous joyous city … joy and revelry, slaughtering of cattle
and sheep, eating of meat and drinking of wine! “Let us eat and drink,” you say,
“for tomorrow we die!” (22:1,13) It seems that Jerusalem has adopted a carefree
upbeat attitude, assuming that if life will be sharp and short, at least it
should be enjoyed. Isaiah challenges this in God's name: "God has called for
weeping, and to mourning, and to baldness, and
to girding with sackcloth" (22:12) in other word, God wishes that the
people would turn to Him. Who is responsible? One government figure is named:
"Go to see this steward, Shevna who is "over the house", and say, What have you
here? and whom have you here, that you have hewn out a tomb for yourself here? …
The Lord is about to shake … and violently toss you … to a broad land. There you
shall die … I will drive you from your station, and you shall be torn from your
stand. And in that day, I will call my servant Elyakim ben Hilkiah. I will
clothe him with your robe, and strengthen him with your girdle, and I will
commit your government into his hand: and he shall be a father to the
inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to the house of Judah. (22:15-21) Shevna, it
seems, is trying to generate a festive mood in the city. But God doesn't
approve. He instructs Isaiah to prophecy against Shevna and to indicate that he
should be replaced by Elyakim. Fascinatingly, our chapter in Melakhim
presents Elyakim as the minister "over the house" indicating that Chizkiyahu
replaced Shevna with Elyakim. This indicates that Chizkiyahu was receptive to
Isaiah's rebuke.
The Rabbis see
Shevna as a sinister figure. His
policy of
revelry hides his true motive; that he was looking out for himself and willing
to betray his king: "What
is [the reference to] 'a confederacy of wicked men'? … When Sennacherib came and
besieged Jerusalem, Shevna wrote a note, which he shot on an arrow [into the
enemy's camp, declaring]: Shevna and his followers are willing to conclude
peace; Chizkiyahu and his followers are not."
(Sanhedrin 26a) Shevna is willing to betray the king and surrender the
city to ensure his own political future. His motive is unclear. Does he support
an alliance with Assyria? Is it self-interest? Does he merely seek to please the
population of Jerusalem?
[14]
Yeshayahu has already
warned of this. See Yeshayahu 30:1-5, 31:1-3.
[15]
Interestingly enough,
other original Assyrian letters reveal an almost identical style of intimidation
and mockery in the face of their enemy. See Letter 1-3 in
Saggs, H. W. F., The Nimrud Letters, 1952 (Cuneiform Texts from Nimrud 5),
24-33.
[16]
The Gemara in Sanhedrin 60a
suggests that Chizkiyahu's men tear their clothes specifically due to
Rav-shakeh's blasphemy. It is in this Talmudic passage that Shmuel is quoted as
suggesting that Rav-shakeh is a Jewish apostate:
“Rav Yehuda said in Shmuel's name: ‘He who hears the Divine Name blasphemed by a
gentile need not rend his clothes. But if you will object: What of Rav-shakeh? —
He was an apostate Israelite.’” Several strands of the story lend
credence to this theory. First, Rav-shakeh is fluent in Hebrew, yet he works for
the enemy. Second, he has intimate knowledge of Chizkiyahu's cult of the
bamot (the local worship sites). In fact, Rav-shakeh's argument in 18:22 is
that God will be angry with Chizkiyahu due to his removal of the bamot.
Rav-shakeh accuses Chizkiyahu of dismantling the bamot so that all Israel
would worship at the royal altar in the Temple. In other words, he suggests that
Chizkiyahu has harmed God in order to serve his own political or egotistical
aspirations. Abarbanel suggest that this line of argument proves that he is
familiar enough with Israelite religious norms but that he adopts an attitude
alien to Torah law. Third, we may suggest that Rav-shakeh’s vicious vilification
of king and God indicate his alienation from and antipathy for his own origins.
[17]
See Bereishit 37:29, Shemuel II 1:11, 3:31, 13:19, 15:3 and
others.
[18]
See Bereishit 44:13, Bamidbar 14:6, Melakhim I 21:27,
Melakhim II 5:8, 11:14, Yoel 2:13, Esther 4:1 and others.
[19] “Yom tzara” – This is a
fascinating phrase. In many instances it indicates God's immediate salvation to
a situation of distress. See for example Bereishit 35:3; Yirmiyahu
16:19-21; Nachum 1:7; and Tehillim 20:2, 50:15.
[20]
H.
Tadmor.
“SennacheribSancheriv's Campaign to Judah: Historical and Historiographical
Considerations.” Zion 50
(1985) 65–80. [Hebrew]
[21]
H.
Tadmor, “Sennacherib's
Campaign to Judah: Historical and Historiographical Considerations,”
Zion 50 (1985),
65–80 [Hebrew].
[22]
(Hezekiah) himself,
like a caged bird I shut up
in Jerusalem, his royal city. I threw up earthworks against him— the one coming out of the city-gate, I
turned back to his misery. His
cities, which I had despoiled, I cut off from his land, and to Mitinti, king of Ashdod, Padi, king of Ekron, and Silli-bêl, king of Gaza, I gave (them). And thus
I diminished his land. I added to the
former tribute, and I laid upon him
the surrender of their land and imposts—gifts for my majesty. As for Chezekia, the terrifying splendor of my majesty
overcame him, and the Arabs and his
mercenary troops which he had brought in to strengthen Jerusalem, his royal city, deserted him … To pay tribute and to
accept servitude, he dispatched his messengers.
[23] Rav Yoel bin Nun and Rav Binyamin
Lau, p. 275.
[24] For more on these messianic
allusions, see A. Grossman, Nevuah le-dorot ke-babuah le-metziut ha-historit
in Y. Z. Rimon, Mussar, Milchama Ve-kibbush, Tevunot, Alon Shevut
(1994), 68-71 [Hebrew].
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