There, too, they looked upon the buildings of old time, the fanes which were there when their forefather Abraham was a dweller in the land, changed, doubtless, beyond recognition. Chief among these was the great temple of Belus, joined to the tower called “the temple of the foundation of heaven and [pg 472] earth,” and which Nebuchadnezzar speaks of as “the tower of Babylon.” There, too, were the shrines dedicated to Zēr-panitum, consort of Merodach, the goddess Nin-maḫ; Nebo, the god of wisdom; Sin, the Moon-god; Šamaš, the Sun-god; Gula, the goddess of healing, and many other divinities. Whilst the Jews were there, they must have seen many of this king's building operations—the strengthening of the fortresses and the walls, and the repair and extension of the moats and ditches; the raising of the level of the great street, Aa-ibûr-sabû (the remains of which have just been found by the German explorers on the site of the city), along which, yearly, at the beginning of the year, processions went, and the images of the gods were in all probability carried. Then there was the rebuilding of the royal palace, with its roof and doors of cedar, the latter being also overlaid with bronze, probably after the manner of the bronze gates of Shalmaneser found by Mr. Rassam at Balawat. The thresholds were also of bronze, and the palace was adorned, in other parts, with gold, silver, precious stones, and various other costly things.
They must have seen, also, the construction, between the two great fortifications called Imgur-Bêl and Nē-mitti-Bêl, of that great building which was to serve as a castle and a royal residence at the same time. This was in connection with the old palace of Nabopolassar, Nebuchadnezzar's father, built, as already stated, in a fortnight. Chief among the shrines restored by Nebuchadnezzar with great magnificence must be mentioned Ê-kua, the sanctuary of Merodach, in the temple Ê-sagila (the temple of Belus), and that called Du-azaga (“the glorious seat”), otherwise described as “the place of fate,” where yearly, on the new year's festival (the 8th and 9th of Nisan) the statue of the god Merodach, “the king of the gods of heaven and earth,” was placed, and the king's future declared on the question being put. Doubtless the [pg 473] glory of the place attracted not a few, causing them to decide to stay there permanently, and these, mingling with the native population, were lost to Israel, like their brethren of the ten tribes, and even as Nergal-êṭir, son of Malakiāwa (see above) seems to have been.
Chapter XIII. The Decline Of Babylon.
The Jews who remained at Babylon and other cities of the land—Alexander the Great's intentions with regard to the city, and the result of their non-fulfilment—A Babylonian lamentation dated in the reign of Seleucus Nicator and his son—The desolation of the city after the foundation of Seleucia—The temples still maintained—Antiochus Epiphanes and the introduction of Greek worship—His invasion of Egypt—The Arsacidæ—A contract of the time of Hyspasines—Materials for history—Further records of the time of the Arsacidæ—The latest date of Babylonian worship—The Christians of Irak or Babylonia.
Notwithstanding the return of large numbers of Jews to Jerusalem, a considerable portion of the nation had become attached to the land of their captivity, and remained in Babylon and the other cities of Chaldea, as well as in Persia. These, no longer captives, but settlers by their own free will, had probably decided to stay in the land either from the desire to continue the businesses which they had started there, the relinquishing of which would have meant, in all probability, ruin to themselves and their families; or because of aged relatives for whom the journey to Jerusalem, however much they might have desired it, would have been an impossibility; or because of official and civil positions which they held either at court or in the employment of rich or influential personages, by whose support they hoped to be able to aid their compatriots; or because of the attractions of a great city, whose origins must for them have possessed a [pg 475] special interest (notwithstanding the horrors of the captivity which their forebears must have experienced there), and whose position for thousands of years as the capital of a large province gave it a preponderating influence, not only in the country of which it was the capital, but in all the civilized world at the time.
This being the case, there numbers of the Jews stayed, and there they witnessed the gradual departure of the sceptre from that city which one of their own writers had described as the glory of kingdoms, and the beauty of the Chaldees' excellency. After the passing of the kingdom into the hands of the alien Persian kings, things went on as usual under their rule for a considerable time—the people lived on their land, and bought and sold, and transacted their ordinary business, and trade seems to have been good (judging from the number of documents which have been preserved) until the end of the reign of Darius Hystaspis. Thereafter there was either a great falling off, or else the documents were deposited in other places, or a more perishable material was used for them. In any case, they become comparatively scarce, and their rarity may be due to the departure of trade from the capital, brought about by the removal of the court from Babylon, and the consequent migration of her merchants to other places.
Things had been going, in fact, from bad to worse for Babylon, and among the clay records left, some of the royal names which we should like to see are to all appearance absent. It was still, however, a place of great importance, when, in the year 331 b.c., it opened its gates to Alexander the Great, surrendering, like Susa and Persepolis, without striking a blow. Doubtless to them it was perfectly indifferent under which foreign potentate they lived, and a change in that respect could not make their condition worse, and might be to their advantage. Had he not died long before the term which nature has fixed, the city [pg 476] might have taken upon it such a renewed lease of life as would have caused it to exist as a great capital to the present day. As it happened, the Babylonians began to see their fondest hopes realized, for it must soon have become noised abroad that the new conqueror of Asia intended to make Babylon his Eastern capital, and they saw the clearing away of the rubbish which was the preliminary to the restoration of the great and renowned temple of Belus, Ê-sagila (or Ê-sangil as they called it at that time), actually proceeding, not only during the reign of Alexander, but also during that of his successor, Philip, as well. The mental calibre of the latter, however, who came to the throne on the death of Alexander in the year 323 b.c., must soon have told the Babylonians that the realization of his great predecessor's schemes was hopeless, and the downward course of the city's star, arrested as it were for a moment, soon began again.