THE ASSYRIAN INVASION AND THE DESTRUCTION OF THE TEN TRIBES OF ISRAEL (885-721)
King of Yahudah, Ahaz reaps reward of his colossal political blunders
Tiglath-Pileser Defeats The Enemies Of Ahaz, King Of Yahudah (734-732)
At the beginning of hostilities Yahudah faced attack from three sides. From the north the country was assailed by the allied armies of Damascus and Yisrael, from the south by Edom and from the south-west by the Philistines. But at this point Tiglath-Pileser's Assyrian army began to move in answer to Ahaz's appeal. The formidable steamroller was ready to crush everything in its path. In three successive campaigns the Assyrians were able to quell the trouble-makers.
734. Tiglath-Pileser went down the coast of Canaan to deal with the Philistines. At Gaza he established a garrison which in the end kept the Egyptians in check.
733. Tiglath-Pileser attacked Yisrael, laid waste the country to the north, deported part of the populations of Galilee and Transjordania, razed Megiddo and Hazor to the ground. But he did not yet attack Samaria.
732. Damascus was besieged and capitulated. King Rezin, the instigator of the coalition, was killed.
In Yisrael Samaria had still to be captured before the annexation of the little which remained of the rest of the territory, that is, Ephraim and a part of Mannaseh. It was easy to see that Tiglath-Pileser would have little difficulty over this. Now, contrary to expectation, Samaria was to escape for the time being. A clever usurper (called Hosea, not to be confused with the prophet mentioned above) took command of the movement of insurrection, murdered the unfortunate and incapable Pekah, seized the crown of Yisrael and lost no time in declaring himself the humble and obedient vassal of the Assyrians. In these circumstances Tiglath-Pileser agreed to leave this figurehead on the throne since, in reality, Yisrael now became an Assyrian province.
It looked as if Ahaz's diplomacy had succeeded, but it had not done so by any means.
Tiglath-Pileser's Harsh Treatment Of His Ally Ahaz, King Of Yahudah
At Yerusalem Ahaz was not long in reaping the reward of his colossal political blunders. Yet with his usual bluntness YeshaYahu had warned him very clearly. Everything feared by the prophet, all the misfortunes and the rest which he had foretold, were to come to pass one after the other.
First came the loss of freedom for the kingdom of Yahudah, which the Assyrian ruler placed on the same level as the conquered nations, taking no consideration of its former status as an ally and friend. Tiglath-Pileser was then occupying Damascus, which he had recently captured. He summoned Ahaz who was called upon to swear fidelity to his new overlord. Ahaz had also to pay over a very large sum in tribute.
A deadly affront was then offered to the believers of YAHWEH. Ahaz was obliged to bow down before the Assyrian deities; he prostrated himself, burned his holocaust and poured a libation. In addition in Yerusalem he built an altar to a Mesopotamian god, which stood in front of the tabernacle of YAHWEH. The great altar of bronze, set up by Solomon in this place of honour, was moved to the side of the Tabernacle. Despite the obscurity of the text (obviously the writer of the book was reluctant to go into details about these wicked changes) it seems fairly certain that some images of Assyrian gods were set up in the Tabernacle itself; the considerable 'purification' which a few years later king Hezekiah was obliged to carry out seems to show that some very strange guests had found a place in YAHWEH's Tabernacle. In addition, on the high places worship of the Baals flourished.
We do not know exactly how YeshaYahu, who had withdrawn to a secret hiding-place, judged these deplorable events. It is not difficult to imagine the great grief which they caused him.
Thus this reign, disastrous on all counts, went on, yet in spite of everything, Yerusalem and Samaria, the capital cities, were still standing. But they did not last long. Samaria was the first to disappear in appalling circumstances.
Hosea, The King Of Yisrael's Double Game (734-724)
To restore his kingdom, Hosea, the new sovereign of Samaria, had only to await one of the frequent reversals of fortune experienced by the Assyrian empire which, although powerful by reason of its extensive nature, was weak at its base.
Just then Shalmaneser succeeded Tiglath-Pileser on the throne of Nineveh. While ostensibly professing complete submission to his Assyrian overlord, Hosea plotted with So, the king of Egypt. It appears that Hosea's machinations had been reported to Shalmaneser who, like all despots, was heavy-handed: Hosea was arrested immediately, thrown into prison and bound in chains. We are not told what fate awaited him but there seems little doubt about it.
This was a favourable opportunity for Assyria to wipe from the map this tiny vassal kingdom whose frontiers had been eaten into considerably by recent annexations. The destruction of Samaria was to be the salutary lesson administered to rebels who endeavoured to join forces with Egypt. Without delay Shalmaneser invaded the much diminished territory of Yisrael and laid siege to Samaria (724).
The Siege Of Samaria, 724-721 (2 Melechim 17)
Although without its leader, the military party of Ephraim, trusting in the strategic position and the huge fortifications of Samaria, decided to offer stubborn resistance to the Assyrian army's attack. The Egyptian pharaoh took good care not to go to the help of his Yisraelite ally whose cause seemed lost in advance.
Leaving a body of troops before the besieged city, Shalmaneser went on to Tyre and Sidon (where, as a matter of fact, he did not achieve the result that he expected). During this expedition to Phoenicia Shalmaneser died somewhat mysteriously. Sharukhin (Sargon II) one of his principal lieutenants, succeeded him at the head of the army and of the government of the kingdom.
The siege of Samaria took its normal course. Modern archaeologists have discovered two enclosures: a carefully constructed inner wall about four and a half feet thick, and an external enclosure of an average width of thirty-two feet with towers and fortifications. The besieging forces may well have been practiced hands nevertheless they must have found the city a difficult obstacle. Finally, at the end of the third year of siege, a heavy attack against the exhausted garrison succeeded in breaching the rampart by battering ram. Samaria, capital of Yisrael, fell into the hands of the Assyrians.
EXILE OF THE INHABITANTS OF THE KINGDOM OF ISRAEL
(SAMARIA) 721 B.C.
721: Samaria, capital of the kingdom of Yisrael, falls into the hands of Sargon, monarch of Assyria, after a three years' siege. The conqueror lays waste the countryside and massacres the inhabitants. Part of the survivors of Samaria were deported; one group of them settled at Halah, south of Nineveh, another group was exiled in the remote country of the Medes (to the north-east of Mesopotamia). In return the region of Samaria was repopulated on the orders of the Assyrian government by inhabitants from Babylon whose religion was Mesopotamian, and natives of Cuthah, Avva, Hamath and Sepharvaim These newcomers, mingled with the Yisraelites who had received permission to remain In their ancestral country, formed the odd spiritual group of doubtful orthodoxy known as the Samaritans.
The Destruction of the Kingdom by YAHWEH Destruction Sitemap Scripture History Through the Ages