The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Chronicles — Section 388

1). If this date be correct, the invasion referred to cannot have been that of Senna- chl'rib (B.c. 701), eighteen or nineteen years after the capture of the northern capital, or in Hezekiah's twenty-fourth year, but must have been an expedition of Sargon, who, ten years earlier (n.o. 711), marched against "the people of Philistia, Judah Edom and Moab," who h11.d formed an 11.llia.nce with the King of Egypt-a mona.~ch wh~ could not save them ; and in particular besieged and took .Ashdod (Smith, • .Assyrian Discoveries,' pp. 291, 292). The expedition 11.gainst Ashdod (Isa. xx. 1) was conducted by Sargon's tartan, or commander-in-chief, "while Sargon himself overran • the wide- spreading land of Judah,' and captured its capital, Jerusalem," The invasion of Jerusalem is referred to in Isa. x., as Calno, Carchemish, Hama.th, .Arpa.d, Damascus and Sa.maria., were conquests, not of Sennacherib, but of Sargon (Sa.yce, • Fresh Light,: etc., p. 137); and beyond question this must be the invasion to which 2 Kings (xviii, 13) and Isaiah (xn:vi. 1) allude, if the date given by them be correct. If, however, Sennacherib's invasion is meant, an error must have crept into the text with reference to the date, and "twenty-fourth" will require to be substituted for the "fourteenth." Kleinert, Sayce, and Profes$or Cheyne (' The Prophecies of Isaiah,' i. 201-210) adopt the former view, that in 2 Kings (xviii. 13), 2 Chronicles (xxxii. 1), and Isaiah (:a:xvi. 1) "Sargon" should be read for "Sennacherib "-an opinion with which G. Smith appears t-0 coincide (' .Assyrian Discoveries,' p. 293); but Schrader (' Die Keilin- schriften,' pp. 309, 310), Robertson Smith (' The Prophets of Israel,' p. 295), Raw- linson (' Kings of Israel and Judah,' p. 187), and Canon Driver ('Isaiah: his Life and Times,' p. 49) regard this view as insufficiently established, and believe the invasion alluded to in all these passages to be that of Sennacherib. II. THE INVADER. 1. Sa,rgon (to adopt the alternative view above referred to). On the monuments, Sarru-kinu, "Strong is the king," or Sar-ukin, "He [God] appointed the king." One of Shalmaneser's generals, probably his tartan, or commander-in- chief, who, on Shalmaneser's death during the siege of Samaria (n.o. 723-720), seized the crown and assumed the name Sargon, "in memory of the famous Babylonian monarch who had reigned so many centuries before" (Sayce). Whether, like Tiglath- Pi!cser II., he had sprung from the ranks (Sayce), or was of kingly descent, probably proceeding from a collateral branch of the royal family (Schrader), cannot be decided; but he was one of the most brilliant potentates that ever sat on the Assyrian throne. A rough and energetic soldier, he conquered in succession Samaria, Egypt, Ashdod, (Jerusalem?), and Babylon, and destroyed the independence of the Hittites at Car- chemish. The town of Khorsaba.d, Dur-Surrukin, the city of Sargon, opposite Mosul, and ten miles from Nineveh, "in the country which borders the mountains," was founded by hirn (' Records,' etc., xi. 33). 2. Sennacheri'b. On the monuments, Sin-ahi- irib, or Sin-ahi-ir-ba, "(The god) Sin multiplies the brothers,"-Sargon's son, who, after his father's assassination, ascended the throne of Assyria on the 12th of .Ab (July), B.C. 705. "Brought up in the purple, he displayed none of the rugged virtues of his father. He was weak, boastful, and cruel, and preserved his empire only by the help of the veterans and generals whom Sargon had trained" (Sayce, '.Assyria,' etc., p. 41). This, of course, was not the opinion of Sennacherib, who, in an inscrip- tion on one of the gigantic bulls guarding the entrance to his palace, speaks of himself as " Sennacherib, great prince, powerful prince, prince of legions, king of the land of Assyria, king of the four regions, worshipped of the great gods, valiant, the manly, the brave, chief of tbe kings of disobedient people, subverter of evil designs" (' Records,' etc., vii. 59). Oriental sovereigns generally had not studied Prov. xxvii. 2, and bad no Dotion of underrating their own virtues, or modestly concealing their own merit. III. THE OBJECT, 1. PrfJXimate. To besiege and capture or break down the fenced cities of Judah (ver. 1). .According to 2 Kings (xvili. 13) and Isaiah (xxxvi. 1), Sennacherib (or Sargon) was in this successful (cf. Isa. x. 5-10). This, according to the monuments, Sargon did while his tartan was besieging .Ashdod, n.o. 711 (Sayce), or in connection with his earlier expedition against Hanno of Gaza and Seveh the Sulian of Egypt in B.c. 720 (Schrader); and Sennacherib in B.O. 701 by besieging, capturing, and plundering forty-six of Hezekiah's cities," strong fortresses and cities without 1.1umber" (' Records,' etc., vii. 62). 2. Ultimate. To capture Jerusalem, which e.1.o, according to the monuments, was taken by Sargon, but not by Sennacherib. The usertion of the Chronicler with reference to the .Assyrian king, that "his face was to CJJ, xxxn.1-83.J THE SECOND BOOK OF THE CHRONICLES. M3