Expedition against Merodachbaladan, 703 B. C.
In my first expedition I accomplished the defeat of Merodachbaladan, King of Babylon, together with the forces of Elam, his ally, in the environs of the city of Kish. In the midst of that battle he left his camp and fled alone; he saved his life. The chariots, horses, wagons, and mules, which at the onset of battle he had left, my hands captured. I entered joyfully into his palace which was in Babylon. I opened his treasure-house; gold, silver, gold and silver utensils, precious stones of all kinds, his untold treasured possessions, a great booty; the women of his palace, princes, his body-guards, male and female musicians, the rest of his troops as many as there were, and the servants of his palace I brought out and counted as spoil.[527]
Campaign against Arabia (between 688 and 682)
Telhunu, the Queen of Arabia, in the midst of the desert—from her I took ... camels. The [luster of] my [lordship] overthrew her and Hazael. They left their tents and fled to Adummatu, which is situated in the desert, ...... a thirsty place, where there is neither food nor drink.[528]
The material contained in the first two passages just quoted from Sennacherib is parallel in a general way to 2 Kings 18, 19 and Isa. 36, 37. All Biblical students recognize that these two chapters in Isaiah are practically identical with the two in Kings. In discussing the parallelism, therefore, we shall refer to 2 Kings 18, 19 only. With reference to the bearing of this Assyrian material upon the Biblical narrative there are three different views which have been entertained by three groups of scholars.
1. One view, which was first expressed by the late Prof. Schrader,[529] of Berlin, is that the inscription of Sennacherib, while differing from the Biblical account in some particulars, really confirms it at nearly every point. Sennacherib, though he claims to have diminished Hezekiah’s territory, and to have received from him a heavy tribute, does not claim to have taken Jerusalem. According to 2 Kings 18:14, ff., Hezekiah submitted to Sennacherib, sending his messenger to Lachish for the purpose, and paid him a heavy tribute; according to 2 Kings 19:35, ff., a great disaster so weakened Sennacherib’s army that he was obliged to withdraw. Schrader called attention to the close correspondence between 2 Kings 18:14 and Sennacherib. Both state that Hezekiah paid 30 talents of gold, though they differ as to the amount of silver, Kings making it 300 talents, while Sennacherib makes it 800. It was supposed that the numbers in the case of the silver were really equivalent to one another, the present divergence being due to textual corruption. Assyrian kings never record their failures, but Sennacherib’s admission that he did not take the city was held to be confirmation of 2 Kings 19:35, ff., which describes a great destruction of the Assyrian army and a signal deliverance of Jerusalem.
2. A second view, of which Prof. Meinhold,[530] of Bonn, may be taken as the chief exponent, starts from the fact that there seem to be two accounts in 2 Kings 18 and 19. In 18:13-16 there is a statement of how Hezekiah sent to Sennacherib, while Sennacherib was besieging Lachish, and admitted that he had done wrong and promised to bear whatever Sennacherib might choose to put upon him. Sennacherib thereupon imposed a heavy tribute upon him, which he paid. The whole transaction seems to be concluded, when at v. 17 the Tartan, or Rabsaris (Rabshakeh), appears upon the scene and taunts Hezekiah for his obstinacy and he submits again. Possibly this might be considered the details of the transaction that was described in mere outline in 18:13-16. When, however, it has all been described again, and the Rabshakeh has returned to Sennacherib at Lachish, Sennacherib again sends messengers (chapter 19:9), again demanding a surrender. These messengers are said to have been sent when Sennacherib heard that Tirhakah, King of Ethiopia, was marching against him. This narrative goes on to tell how Hezekiah, acting under the advice of Isaiah, delayed his surrender, and how the camp of the Assyrians was decimated by the angel of the Lord, and Jerusalem escaped.
Meinhold and his followers hold that there are here two inconsistent accounts. According to the first, Hezekiah surrendered; according to the second, he did not. According to the first, Hezekiah paid tribute; according to the second, Sennacherib’s army was destroyed. The first of these accounts is confirmed by Sennacherib’s inscription; the second is, so Meinhold holds, shown by it to be unhistorical: first, by the fact that Sennacherib gives no hint that his army was harmed, and, secondly, by the mention of Tirhakah, who did not come to the throne until 688 B. C., and could not, therefore, have been a factor in the war of 701 B. C.
A third view was suggested by Winckler[531] and is held by Prašek,[532] Fullerton,[533] and Rogers.[534] According to this view, Sennacherib made two expeditions against Jerusalem, and 2 Kings 18:13-19:8 is an account of the first of these (the expedition of 701), while 2 Kings 19:9-36 is the account of the second,—an expedition which did not occur until after the accession of Tirhakah, eight or ten years later. The inscription of Sennacherib, already quoted, refers to the first of these expeditions only. We have no inscription of Sennacherib referring to the later disastrous campaign, but that is not surprising, for unless the account of his expedition against the queen of Arabia, already quoted above, belongs to this period, we have no inscriptions referring to the last eight years of his reign. It is thought by the scholars who believe that there were two expeditions, that Sennacherib would approach the queen of Arabia only from the west, so that that inscription is regarded as an incidental confirmation of this view. Of course, an Assyrian king would not record a disaster.