* With hue like that when some t ter dij His pencil in the gloom of Gia ena eclipeey?
adel for us in graphic and lurid touches the onward march of those marshalled hosts of Tiglath-pileser’s army of invasion. ‘Behold, hastily, swiftly he cometh. There is none that is weary orstumbleth. He stumbleth not nor sleepeth. The paue of his loins is never loosed, nor the thong of
is sandals rent—whose arrows are sharp, and all his bows bent ; whose horses’ hoofs are accounted as flint, and his wheels like the whirlwind. His roar is like that of the lioness; he roareth like the young lions, moaning and catching the prey and carrying it off safe, and there is none to rescue. And at that time there is moaning over it like the moaning of the sea; and if one looketh to the earth, behold, oppressive darkness |!’ (Is 5%-*),*
n the annals of Tiglath-pileser we read the fol- lowing brief details from a seriously mutilated in- scription:+—‘ The town Gilfead] . . . Abel [Maacha] which are above the land Beth Omri (Samaria) . . . the broad, I smote in its entire extent into the territory of Assyria, and placed my officers as viceroys over them.t Hanno of Gaza, who had taken to flight in fear of my weapons, fled into the land of Egypt. Gaza I captured ; its possessions, its gods I carried away captive... The land Beth Omri (Samaria), the whole of its inhabitants, together with their booty, I carried off to Tie τὸ Pekah their king, I slew. Hoshea (Ausi) I ap- pointed as ruler over them.’
So perished ‘like a chip on the water’s surface’ Hos 107) another ill-fated king of Ephraim. The
euteronomic redactor paints him in the dark and monotonous hues of the long line of Jeroboam ben Nebat’s successors. This may be interpreted to mean that he was tolerant of the religious condi- tions which prevailed during the middle of the 8th cent. The numerous high places or baméth, where Jehovah was worshipped, fostered modes of cultus which closely approximated to those of the Canaanite baalim. The oracles of the prophet Hosea, which clearly belong to the Ephraimite kingdom, vividly depict the disorders that pre-
* This was probably written by the prophet as a reminiscence of what he had actually experienced by personal observation or learned from eye-witnesses of the events of πιο, 734. The date of the oracle is probably 8.0. 726. See article Hosuma, and foot- note ἡ, p. 426 in vol. ii.
ἡ Schrader, KIB il. p. 80.
t The towns lyyon, Abel-beth-Maacah, Kadesh, and Janoah (2 K 15, cf. 1 K 1639 91!) appear to have all belonged to Galilee and Naphtali. Janoah is evidently α different place from that of the same name in Jos 1086, Kittel identifies it with Jenoam Jenwamu of the Egyptian records; see Miller, Asien τ,
ropa, p. 394), an Israelite frontier town towards Tyre. Benzinger would delete Gilead from the text {perbeps ditto- graphy). ΠῚ Rawl. 10. 2, lines 17 foll. . . . th (mabAzu) Ga-al « +» (A)}-bi-il is all we have to guide us.
VOL. I1t.—a7
vailed during the reign of Pekah. Chapters 4 and also 6 and 7 present a lurid picture of the social evils of the time. Gilead, we are told, ‘is a cit
of them that work iniquity, it is tracked with blood-stains. As robber bands lie in wait for a man, so the company of priests murder on the way to Shechem’ (6%), In ch. 4 the prophet rebukes the lying and stealing, the murder and bloodshed, while among all classes of society the grossest forms of sensuality and superstition prevailed (vy.) 18) ; see article HosEa.
Winckler (Gesch, Isr. pp. 92-95) would place the latter part of the prophetic activity of Amos as late as the reign of Pekah on account of the re- ferences to the dismemberment of Israel in 3%. thle ΤΌΣΕΣ. read ex in place of mex in νῦ.
erhaps, however, it is not n to bring his oracles down to a later date than ΒΟ. 738, Ε
ΟΥΕΝ C. WHITEHOUSE.
PEKAHIAH (7;np3 ‘ J” has opened’ ; B daxecias, A Paxelas, Luc. baxecd).—King of Israel for two years, son and successor of Menahem (2 Καὶ 15*-*),” Two dates fixed by Assyrian records determine with unusual closeness the years of his reign. The inscriptions of Tiglath-pileser ΠῚ. show that Mena- hem was alive in 738, and that Pekabiah’s suc- cessor, Pekah, was dethroned in 734-733. It follows in all probability that the years 737 and 736 include the whole or the greater part of Pekabiah’s reign. The synchronism of 2K 15 is improbable. It is unlikely that Azariah of Judah was living in 737, since az was king in 734 and the reign of Jotham comes between.—The internal condition of Israel in this reign has all its features in common with Hosea’s general picture of the period (see HoseEA). Nor can there be any doubt what the critical question of foreign policy was,—whether the attitude to Assyria should one of sub- mission, or one of resistance in co-operation with other Syrian states. The absence of Tiglath- pileser in the north allowed time for negotiation and debate. Pekahiah’s assassination by his mili- tary adjutant or attendant may have been planned in co uence of his opposition to war with Assyria Possibly Rezin of Damascus was cognizant of the plan, and sanctioned it as a means of bringing Israel and Damascusintoline. The text relating the event is now corrupt (2K 15"). The r seems to have employed a force of Gileadites, which was probably suflicient to secure Samaria and so accomplish the revolution. It is not clear whether ‘Argob’ and ‘ Arieh’ were defenders or assailants of the king. The name Argob suggests that the words were originally some statement about the Gileadites (cf. Stade, Geschichte, i. 588).