The Old Testament in the Light of the Historical Records and Legends of Assyria and Babylonia

by Theophilus G. Pinches

Amorites.

The earliest mention of the Amorites in the Old Testament is the passage in Gen. x. 16, where the name occurs along with that of the Jebusites and the Girgashites, from which may be gathered that they were all three very powerful tribes, though their power is in all probability not to be measured by the order of their names, the most important of the three being the Amorites, whose name comes second. They were regarded by the ancient Jews as an iniquitous and wicked people (Gen. xv. 6; 2 Kings xxi. 11), though they may not, in reality, have been worse than other nations which were their contemporaries. That they were a powerful nation is implied by the statement in Gen. xlviii. 22, where Jacob speaks of the tract which he had taken out of the hand of the Amorite with his sword and his bow, as a feat of which a warrior might be proud.

The Amorites in Babylonia have already been referred to in Chap. [V.], and from that part of the present work it will easily be understood that they were an extensive and powerful nationality, capable, with organization, of extending their power, as they [pg 311] evidently did from time to time, far and wide. Indeed, as has been pointed out, there is great probability that the Babylonian dynasty called by Berosus Arabic, was in reality Amorite. In any case, the kings of this dynasty held sway over Amoria, as the inscription of Ammi-ṭitana, translated on p. [155], clearly shows. The importance of this nationality in the eyes of the Babylonians is proved by the fact that their designation for “west” was “the land of Amurrū,” and the west wind was, even with the Assyrians, “the wind of the land of Amurrū” (though the Hittites, in Assyrian times, seem to have been the more powerful nation), and this designation of the western point of the compass probably long outlived the renown of the nationality from which the expression was derived. Among other Biblical passages, testifying to the power of the Amorites, may be quoted as typical Amos ii. 9, 10, and in this the Babylonian and the Hebrew records are quite in agreement.

As has been pointed out by Prof. Sayce, in process of time a great many tribes—Gibeonites, Hivites, Jebusites, and even Hittites—were classed as Amorites by the ancient Jewish writers, a circumstance which likewise testifies to the power of the nationality. These identifications must be to a large extent due to the fact that all the tribes or nationalities referred to were mountaineers, and, as we have seen (p. [122]), the Akkadian character for a mountainous region or nationality, stood not only for Armenia, and the land of the Amorites, but also for the land of Akkad, because the Akkadians came from a mountainous country, perhaps somewhere in the neighbourhood of the mountains of Elam. This character was pronounced Ari when it stood for Amoria, but ceased to be used for that on account of its signifying also the mountainous region of Armenia, and Akkad, for which it still continued to be employed, and it is only the context, [pg 312] in many cases, which enables the reader to gather which is meant. Other groups used for Amoria were the sign for foot, twice over (sometimes with one of them reversed), [Cuneiform], and [Cuneiform], the ordinary pronunciation of which is Saršar, though it is probable that the latter was pronounced, in Akkadian, like the former, i.e. Tidnu. In the inscriptions of Gudea, viceroy of Lagaš about 2700 b.c., there occurs the name of a country called Tidalum, “a mountain of Martu,” from which a kind of limestone was brought. This Hommel and Sayce regard as another form of Tidnu, by the interchange of l and n, which is not uncommon in Akkadian. The fact that Martu is also used in the inscriptions for Amurrū, (the land of) the Amorites, and also, with the prefix for divinity, for the Amorite god (îlu Amurrū), which was introduced into Babylonia at an exceedingly early date, confirms this explanation. In all probability there is not at present sufficient data for ascertaining the dates when these names first appear, but Tidnu or Tidalu was probably the earlier of the two.

What the exact boundaries of the district were are doubtful. Prof. Sayce, after examining the Tel-el-Amarna tablets, comes to the conclusion that it denoted the inland region immediately to the north of the Palestine of later days. In this Petrie concurs, the country being, according to him, the district of middle and lower Orontes, and certainly covering a large area. This, of course, would be the position of the tract over which they held sway in the earlier ages, but later they must have extended their power so as to embrace the Jebusites (Jerusalem), and even Mamre in Gen. xiv. 13. From this wide extension of the dominions of the Amorites in the book of the Bible dealing with the earliest period of Jewish history, and from the fact that the Assyro-Babylonians used the word to indicate the west in general, it is clear that the Amorites occupied a wide tract in the earlier [pg 313] ages, and must have been pushed gradually back, probably by the Babylonians under Sargon of Agadé, leaving, however, centres of Amorite influence in the south, which, when the power of Egypt, which followed that of Babylonia, waned and disappeared, left certain independent states under Amorite rulers. It is thus that, at the time of the Exodus, we find Og ruling at Bashan, who had threescore cities, all the region of Argob, his chief seats being Edrei and Ashtaroth. This ruler and his people were of the remnant of the Rephaim, regarded by Sayce as of Amorite origin (Hastings's Dictionary of the Bible, under “Amorites”). Whatever doubt there may be, however, about the origin of the Bashanites, there is none concerning Sihon king of the Amorites dwelling more to the south. A man of great courage and daring, he had driven the Moabites out of their territory, obliging them to retreat across the Arnon. On the entry of the Israelites, he gathered his troops and attacked them, but was defeated and killed. Josephus (Ant. iv. 5, sect. 2) has some curious details of this battle, in which he states that the Amorites were unable to fight successfully when away from the shelter of their cities, but in view of their successes against the Moabites, we may be permitted to doubt this.

In the Tel-el-Amarna tablets the ruler of the Amorites is apparently Abdi-Aširti,[78] who, with his son Aziru, warred successfully against Rib-Addi (Rib-Hadad), governor of Phœnicia, driving him from Ṣumuru and Gublu (Gebal), which last city was occupied, according to Petrie's analysis, by the two hostile parties in turn. Naturally there are a great many recriminations on the part of Rib-Addi against Abdi-Aširti on account of the hostility between them, and the former is constantly complaining to the Pharaoh of what the latter had done, frequently calling him a dog, and once seemingly referring to the Amorites [pg 314] as “dogs.” (Elsewhere Abdi-Aširti applies this word to himself as an expression of humility.) His letters to the king of Egypt, however, are merely assurances of fidelity, and are all short:—

“To the king my lord say then thus: ‘(It is) Abdi-Aštarti, the king's servant. At the feet of the king my lord I fall down—seven (times at) the feet of the king my lord, and seven times again (?) both front part and back. And may the king my lord know that strong is the hostility against me, and let it be acceptable before the king my lord, and let him direct one of the great men to protect me.’

“ ‘Secondly, the king my lord has sent word to me, and I have heard—I have heard all the words of the king my lord. Behold, the ten women forgotten (?) I have brought’ ” (?).

(It is here worthy of note, that he does not, in this letter, call himself Abdi-Aširti, “servant of the Ashera,” but Abdi-Aštarti, “servant of Astarte,” using the Assyro-Babylonian ideograph for Ištar, the original of the goddess in question. On another document from him, the word is spelled out, Ab-di-aš-ta-ti, in which the scribe intended to write Ab-di-aš-ta-ar-ti, but omitted the last character but one. Yet another letter gives his name as Abdi-Aš-ra-tum, in the second element of which we must see another form of Abdi-Aširti, unless the scribe has also made a mistake in this case, and written Ašratum for Aštaratum, which is just possible. In any case, it shows a close connection between the goddess Aštarte or Ištar, and the Ashera, which was in Palestine, at that date, and for centuries before and after, her emblem. To be the servant of the one was to be the servant of the other, though the bearer of the name seems to have the desire rather to be considered the priest of the goddess. Even unintentional variants in names furnish valuable contributions at times to comparative mythology.)

If there are but few letters from the father, there is [pg 315] a sufficient number, and of considerable extent, from the son. He, too, is the faithful servant of the Pharaoh, and he writes also to Dûdu (a form of the name David) and Ḫâi, telling of the difficulties which he had with regard to the king of the Hittites. It is apparently this prince to whom the Pharaoh writes in the letter translated on pp. [300-302], a circumstance which leads to the belief that the complaints of Rib-Addi with regard to Abdi-Aširti and his son Aziru were well-founded. That the king of Egypt asks therein for the delivery to him of certain persons whom he names, implies that he had trustworthy information as to who the intriguers were, and though apparently willing to give Aziru the benefit of the doubt, he certainly did not hold him blameless.

It will probably be long ere the true order of these letters is known, and until this be found, much of the history of the period to which they refer must necessarily remain uncertain.