* The scheme of the present work prevents me from doing more
than allude in passing to these preliminary stages in the
composition of the Priestly Code. I shall have occasion to
return briefly to the subject at the close of Volume IX.
** The date is supplied by the opening passage of the
prophecy of Jeremiah, “to whom the word of Jehovah came in
the days of Josiah, the son of Amon, King of Judah, in the
thirteenth year of his reign” (i. 2). Volney recognised
that chaps, i., iv., v., and vi. of Jeremiah refer to the
Scythian invasion, and since his time it has been admitted
that, with the exception of certain interpolations in chaps,
i. and iii., the whole of the first six chapters date from
this period, but that they underwent slight modifications in
the recension which was made in the fourth year of
Jehoiachin in order to make them applicable to the
threatened Chaldæan invasion. The date is important, since
by using it as a basis we can approximately restore the
chronology of the whole period. If we assume the thirteenth
year of Josiah to have been 627-626 B.C., we are compelled
to place all the early Medic wars in the reign of Assur-
bani-pal, as I have done.
This barbarian invasion, which burst upon the peace of Assyria like a thunderbolt from a cloudless sky, restored to the faithful that confidence in the omnipotence of their God which had seemed about to fail them; when they beheld the downfall of states, the sack of provinces innumerable, whole provinces in flames and whole peoples irresistibly swept away to death or slavery, they began to ask themselves whether these were not signs of the divine wrath, indicating that the day of Jahveh was at hand. Prophets arose to announce the approaching judgment, among the rest a certain Zephaniah, a great-grandson of Hezekiah:* “I will utterly consume all things from off the face of the ground, saith Jahveh. I will consume man and beast; I will consume the fowls of the heaven, and the fishes of the sea, and the stumbling-blocks with the wicked; and I will cut off man from the face of the earth, saith Jahveh. And I will stretch out My hand upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and I will cut off the remnant of Baal from this place, and the name of the Chemarim with the priests; and them that worship the host of heaven upon the housetops; and them that worship, which swear to Jahveh and swear by Malcham; and them that are turned back from following Jahveh; and those that have not sought Jahveh nor inquired after Him. Hold thy peace at the presence of the Lord Jahveh; for the day of Jahveh is at hand; for Jahveh hath prepared a sacrifice, He hath sanctified His guests.”
* Zephaniah gives his own genealogy at the beginning of his
prophecy (i. 1), though, it is true, he does not add the
title “King of Judah” after the name of his ancestor
Hezekiah.
“That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasteness and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness, a day of the trumpet and alarm, against the fenced cities, and against the high battlements. And I will bring distress upon men, that they shall walk like blind men, because they have sinned against Jahveh: and their blood shall be poured out as dust, and their flesh as dung. Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of Jahveh’s wrath; but the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of His jealousy; for He shall make an end, yea, a terrible end, of all them that dwell in the land.” During this same period of stress and terror, there came forward another prophet, one of the greatest among the prophets of Israel—Jeremiah, son of Hilkiah. He was born in the village of Anathoth, near Jerusalem, being descended from one of those priestly families in which the faith had been handed down from generation to generation in all its original purity.*
* The descent and birthplace of Jeremiah are given at the
beginning of his prophecies (i. 1). He must have been quite
young in the thirteenth year of Josiah, as is evident from
the statement in i. 6. We are told in chap, xxxvi. that in
the fourth year of Jehoiakim he dictated a summary of all
the prophecies delivered by him from the thirteenth year of
Josiah up to the date indicated to his servant Baruch, and
that later on he added a number of others of the same kind.
When Jahveh called him, he cried out in amazement, “Ah, Lord God! behold, I cannot speak: for I am a child.” But Jahveh reassured him, and touching his lips, said unto him, “Behold, I have put My words in thy mouth: see, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to pluck up and to break down, and to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant.” Then the prophet perceived a seething cauldron, the face of which appeared from the north, for the Eternal declared to him that “Out of the north evil shall break out upon all the inhabitants of the land.” Already the enemy is hastening: “Behold, he shall come up as clouds, and his chariots shall be as the whirlwind: his horses are swifter than eagles. Woe unto us! for we are spoiled. O Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness, that thou mayest be saved. How long shall thine evil thoughts lodge within thee? For a voice declareth from Dan, and publisheth evil from the hills of Ephraim: make ye mention to the nations; behold, publish against Jerusalem!” The Scythians had hardly been mentioned before they were already beneath the walls, and the prophet almost swoons with horror at the sound of their approach. “My bowels, my bowels! I am pained at my very heart: my heart is disquieted in me; I cannot hold my peace; because thou hast heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. Destruction upon destruction is cried; for the whole land is spoiled, and my curtains in a moment. How long shall I see the standard and hear the sound of the trumpet?” It would seem that the torrent of invasion turned aside from the mountains of Judah; it flowed over Galilee, Samaria, and the Philistine Shephelah, its last eddies dying away on the frontiers of Egypt. Psammetiehus is said to have bribed the barbarians to retire. As they fell back they plundered the temple of Derketô, near Ashkelon: we are told that in order to punish them for this act of sacrilege, the goddess visited them with a disease which caused serious ravages amongst them, and which the survivors carried back with them to their own country.*
* Herodotus calls the goddess Aphrodite Urania, by which we
must understand Derketô or Atargatis, who is mentioned by
several other classical authors, e.g. Xanthus of Lydia,
Diodorus Siculus, Strabo, Pliny. According to Justin, the
Scythians were stopped only by the marshes of the Delta. The
disease by which the Scythians were attacked is described by
Hippocrates; but in spite of what he tells us about it, its
precise nature has not yet been determined.
There was, however, no need to introduce a supernatural agency in order to account for their rapid disappearance. The main body of invaders had never quitted Media or the northern part of the Assyrian empire, and only the southern regions of Syria were in all probability exposed to the attacks of isolated bands. These stragglers, who year after year embarked in one desperate adventure after another, must have found great difficulty in filling up the gaps which even victories made in their ranks; enervated by the relaxing nature of the climate, they could offer little resistance to disease, and excess completed what the climate had begun, the result being that most of them died on the way, and only a few survived to rejoin the main body with their booty. For several months the tide of invasion continued to rise, then it ebbed as quickly as it had risen, till soon nothing was left to mark where it had passed save a pathway of ruins, not easily made good, and a feeling of terror which it took many a year to efface. It was long before Judah forgot the “mighty nation, the ancient nation, the nation whose language thou knowest not, neither understandest thou what they say.” * Men could still picture in imagination their squadrons marauding over the plains, robbing the fellah of his crops, his bread, his daughters, his sheep and oxen, his vines and fig trees, for “they lay hold on bow and spear; they are cruel and have no mercy; their voice roareth like the sea, and they ride upon horses; every one set in array as a man to the battle,** against thee, O daughter of Sion. We have heard the fame thereof; our hands wax feeble; anguish hath taken hold of us, and pangs as of a woman in travail.” *** The supremacy of the Scythians was of short duration. It was said in after-times that they had kept the whole of Asia in a state of terror for twenty-eight years, dating from their defeat of Cyaxares; but the length of this period is exaggerated.****
* Jer. v. 15; it seems curious that the Hebrew prophet
should use the epithet “ancient,” when we remember that the
Scythians claimed to be the oldest nation in the world,
older than even the Egyptians themselves.
** An obvious allusion to the regular formation adopted by
the Scythian squadrons.
*** Jer. v. 17; vi. 23, 24.
**** The authenticity of the number of years given in
Herodotus has been energetically defended by some modern
historians, and not less forcibly denied by others, who
reduce it, for example, in accordance with a doubtful
passage of Justin, to eight years. By assigning all the
events relating to the Scythian invaders to the mean period
of twenty years, we should obtain the length of time which
best corresponds to what is actually known of the general
history of this epoch.
The Medes soon recovered from their disaster, but before engaging their foes in open conflict, they desired to rid themselves of the prince who had conquered them, and on whom the fortunes of the whole Scythian nation depended. Cyaxares, therefore, invited Madyes and his officers to a banquet, and after plying them to excess with meat and drink, he caused them all to be slain.*