In this lesson, David Capoccia discusses biblical archaeology related to the time of Israel’s being taken into captivity. Specifically, David Capoccia discusses Assyria’s and Babylon’s invasions of Judah. These historical events written about in the Bible are confirmed and further described through findings at Tel Lachish, Sennacherib’s palace relief sculptures, Hezekiah’s Broad Wall and Water Tunnel, the Prism of Sennacherib, the Babylonian Chronicles, the Jehoiachin Ration Tablet, the Lachish Letters, and the Nebo-Sarsekim Tablet.
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to class but last week we talked about archaeology related to David and Solomon that was the focus of our time what do minimalists archaeologist claim when it comes to these two kings what do they often claim yeah Steve just represent that’s right the these are figures these are legends these are myths they were ideals for the Israelite Kings or they also make another claim what’s the other claim they make about David and Solomon he may have existed but he wasn’t that great he was just a tribal Chieftain he had a small small sort of rule not much power not much influence well what pieces of archaeology that we looked at last week actually contradict those kinds of claims what was one of them Ste yeah there were two Steels that we looked at last week anybody remember the names of them well we have a we’ve looked at a number of Steels you may be thinking of the man steel but no that one was actually a couple of weeks ago tan steel and the Misha steel now does anybody remember what those actually were they’re both boasts they’re both boasts of two different Kings enemy Kings neighboring Kings of Israel the tan steel was the boast of the king of Syria that the Bible identifies as haziel he boasts of how he defeated Israel in battle and the Misha steel King Misha of Moab boasts about how he defeated Israel in battle what are the most significant Parts though of these two steals yeah Steve the house of that’s right they both mention the phrase House of David and why is that significant yeah Eric yeah well that’s certainly true as as they talk about these kings that they face the descendants of David they were important and so that would show that the Kingdom of Israel was important but it also shows that what were you gonna say Magna I was just G to say that House of David was real that’s right it also shows that it was existent if the enemy kings are identifying there um the Kings of Israel was belonging to the House of David and that assert that shows that David was a real person because the enemies of Israel were treating him like a real person they were treating his house like a real dynastic house so very important parts of these two steals among other things we also looked at a fortress City kuet KFA in last week’s class why is why are cities like KU KFA important for the debate about David and Solomon’s existence and their amount of power yes Steve Jalem and their territ expansive that’s right the fact that in the period of David and Solomon where these cities can be dated too the fact that they exist the fact that they could be built the fact that they could be maintained shows that the kingdoms under David and Solomon must have been strong because you need a centralized you need an Advanced you need an urbanized state or Kingdom to be able to produce those cities to be able to organize the labor to be able to cut the stones Etc to be able to produce Fortress cities like K KFA so this shows the claims of these minimalist archaeologists even in the archaeology are contradicted of course we don’t need these pieces of archaeology to believe what the Bible says about David and Solomon we know that ultimately we can believe the word of God regardless of what claims are made outside of the Bible but as I say or as I said minimalists and Skeptics find the archaeology itself contradicting their claims David and Solomon were real Kings they were powerful Kings and they left their imprint in the ground at Palestine questions about last week’s lesson okay well in today’s lesson we’re going to do things a little bit differently today’s and the next um the next lesson we do in the Exile we’ve got a lot to talk about and rather than organizing the lesson around certain archaeological finds I’m going to overview the history of three Empires the three Empires related to Israel’s Exile and conquest and as I do that I’m going to refer to different pieces of archaeology related to those Empires now which Empires are we talking about Assyria babyon and Persia Assyria Babylon and Persia Assyria took the Northern Kingdom of Israel into captivity and then threatened the southern Kingdom the southern Kingdom of Judah Babylon later overtook the Assyrian Empire and then also took Judah into captivity later Persia conquered the Babylonian Empire and allowed the exiled Jews to return to their Homeland and rebuild the Temple so we’re going to talk a little bit about those Empires some chronological reminders these comes from James Usher’s timeline remember others might put the dates just a little bit differently but we have the divided Kingdom from about 975 BC to 721 in the north that would be when Assyria um conquer Samaria takes Northern the northern kingdom into captivity and then we have the southern Kingdom lasting till about 588 BC when Babylon takes Israel into captivity after the second invasion Daniel would be taken into captivity in the the first Invasion the first invasion of Judah under Nebuchadnezzar so around 607 BC and then we have the decree of Cyrus about 70 years later 537 BC or is it 70 years I can’t remember the the exact prophecy but yeah we have the decree of Cyrus about 537 BC let’s pray now before we go further Lord God I thank you thank you that you’re Sovereign over history and God as we consider some of the things we’re going to be talking about today Lord just how how amazing it is the way you deliver in the darkest hour and yet God how Dreadful it is when there is no Deliverance in such a dark hour when when people do not look to you or when you have abandoned a people oh Lord the horor that awaits them when God is Not on their side now Lord we thank you that you are on our side that we can praise you God that ultimately you will deliver us just like Paul boasted that you delivered him from the lion’s mouth even ultimately by allowing him to be martyred so God we’re confident that you will Deliver Us Lord encourage encourage us as we investigate this archaeology give me the ability to explain it in Jesus name amen okay now I don’t have a handout for you today and that’s because for some reason I left it at home and I have this really cool thing to show you about seal Impressions but because I left that at home we’re going to wait till next week because there’s a whole bunch of people in the Bible who are confirmed by um by the seal Impressions that we see in the city of David but we’ll hold off on that let’s talk about the geography around Israel you probably heard the Bible make various references to kingdoms around Israel but where exactly were those kingdoms mentioned things like Moab or Aram or um Lisa I think it’d be good to just reorient ourselves a little bit to the geography in the divided Kingdom Period so here’s a map hopefully you can see most of it I know some of the words might be a little bit dark but we’ve got the two kingdoms in the middle we’ve got Israel at the top that blue and then we have the southern Kingdom Judah in that lighter red to the West we have philistia or the Philistine States that’ be kind of like the Gaza Strip today the Southwest not pictured we have which kingdom Egyptian that’s right the Kingdom of Egypt to the South we have Edom Edom was the name for the descendants of which person Esau that’s right and then to the east we have Moab and Ammon Moab in the purple there Ammon in the brown those were the descendants of whom lot they were lot’s descendants remember God says you can’t have their territory but they ended up being enemies of Israel um throughout Israel’s history so Northeast we have Aram in that teal there arum with his capital in Damascus Aram is sometimes called or translated as Syria directly north of Israel that brown section there we have the Phoenician states which would include Ty and siden those coastal cities and in the northeast corner you can just barely see it there we have the Assyrian Empire so they would be to the Northeast and a little bit to the east where’s Babylon from here it would be east across the desert remember you don’t travel across the desert you won’t survive so You’ to get to Babylon you’d have to go all the way around you have to kind of come up the same way that Abraham did whenever he traveled from ER southern Mesopotamia into Canaan so Babylon was a long way away or at least what seemed like a long way away remember Hezekiah he had some visitors from Babylon he shows them all the gold and when the prophet asks him who were those people where’ they come from he said oh some far off place called Babylon it’s like oh one day they’re going to conquer you anyways at various points in history different kingdoms gain power and act as the bullies of the region plundering displacing and exacting Promises of Financial and Military cooperation from the neighbors from the neighboring Nations so even some of the kingdoms here dominated at certain times sometimes we have Egypt as the great power sometimes we have Syria as the great power sometimes Israel is the great power particularly under David and Solomon but by the end of the 8th Century BC we have Assyria as the great power let me show you a map illustrating that so here we have green and there’s another section of kind of Darker green this was the Assyrian Empire at its height conquered Egypt conquered Babylon conquered parts of turkey and conquered almost all of the Middle East and but before their great expansion they would just be that kind of Darker green region that Northeast section going down into mes poia by around 740 BC Assyria begins to successfully dominate its neighbors and begins to expand greatly going east west and southwest toward the Northern Kingdom of Israel in 721 BC Samaria falls to the besieging Assyrians and most of the isra Israelites in the north are killed excuse me killed or carried away into captivity 705 BC a new ruler takes the throne in Assyria the the the Empire of Assyria by the name of sakar you may remember that name as is often the case when a new ruler takes over the previously subjugated Kings and peoples get ideas of rebellion say oh new king not established this is a good time to break free so Egypt along with several other kingdoms including Judah under Hezekiah they threw off the Assyrian yoke and they rebelled but that meant that war was coming sakb fights against the Egyptians defeats Egypt defeats the other members of the Egyptian Alliance and then in 701 BC Begins ravaging the cities of Judah intent on conquering Jerusalem and we read about this in Second Kings open your Bibles to 2 Kings 18 we’re going to notice a couple things in this passage 2 Kings chapter 18 we read about Sak’s in Sak’s invasion of Judah look at verse 13 2 Kings 18:13 now in the 14th year excuse me now in the 14th year of King Hezekiah sakib king of Assyria came up against all the Fortified cities of Judah and seized them okay not sure why this there’s a blank piece of paper here hopefully that’s not missing anything important so sakro comes up to invade the cities of Judah and one of the cities that he devastates is the city of lakish now this city was heavily fortified and situated in such a way that if you wanted to take Jerusalem you first had to take lakish now archaeologists have Unearthed lakish ancient lakish the site is now known as t adir or t lakish the site does indeed contain evidence of an Assyrian assault there’s T leish situated very um very strategically on the top of this hill so a good defensible position but unearthing this site they found evidence of this Assyrian assault on lakish they Assyrian arrowheads that litter the site there are various Earth and Siege Mounds that were left there or that that were evident in the ground and a nearby cave was found to contain a mass grave from this period 1,600 sets of skeletal remains were dumped in this cave they were the result of the battle of the Assyrians and the judeans at lakish the destruction of lakish is further Illustrated on some relief sculptures in sakib’s Palace in Nineveh Nineveh was the capital of the Assyrian Empire and I’m going to show some of these pictures to you these sculpture reliefs from Sak’s Palace but just the warn you they do get a little Grizzly a little gory here’s the first one this is a picture of some Siege machines an Assyrian battering ram in the bottom left here and right next to it is a Siege Tower and they’re coming up against the the city of lakish you can see the archers there on the top of lakish doing their best to defend against the Assyrians and there’s an Assyrian Archer there at the top of that Siege Tower oh I should mentioned the the inscription that goes along with these pictures gives you some indication of of uh I think the the brutality of what what we’re going to be looking at here’s what was inscribed next to these reliefs sakb the mighty king king of the country of Assyria sitting on the throne of judgment before the city of lakish I give permission for its Slaughter so here’s the first picture Siege machines here’s another picture from the the reliefs from his Palace these are some Assyrian archers and they’re next to a Siege ramp this bottom little ramp thing there on the bottom left and they are behind some wicker Shield walls those those big uh those thin barriers right in front of each of the set of archers May notice something strange in the top left those are Israelite soldiers impaled on spikes then there’s the third picture kind of weird looking at first oh I can’t see it too well with the glare but what do you notice on the left side of this picture what can you make out yeah there’s some children it’s awesome an adult there I know it might be a little bit hard to see but that’s a woman how how would you describe the expressions of the the children and the woman notice the the way the arms are up and how the children are kind of like tugging on the tugging on the woman how would you describe their expressions yeah there’s an expression of well they’re certainly they’re looking to the right and based on that they they’re reacting in some way I think the the hands put up by the woman there’s there’s some sort of trauma happening here she’s really distressed at what she’s looking at and so are the children they’re looking and then holding on to their presumably their mother well what’s going on on the right I think arm Mano is very ger to suggest that this is some kind of torture because it is these are men these are Israelite soldiers who are being skinned alive so what you’re seeing here is after they’ve taken over the city the Assyrians are torturing the men while their families watch this is brutal this is heartbreaking but there is a reason for all of this the Assyrians weren’t simply cruel why the slaughter and torture of the inhabitants of lakish this was calculated why would they do this yes Steve cities exactly right if they could do this to one of the strongholds all the other studies should watch out this is a message this is olical Warfare weaken the will of your enemy to resist discourage others from rebelling by showing that when you conquer a city the people are brutalized they are tortured they are slaughtered it should cause people to think twice about resisting imagine your Hezekiah you’re King Hezekiah and you get the report from Lakes the city is Fallen many of the people there have been brutally slaughtered many of them have been tortured and others have been taken captive what do you do lakish is one of the most important cities in fact it’s it’s the one that you always take over when you’re about to take over Jerusalem it’s like the last City before you get to Jerusalem if lakish has fallen what do you do where is god well notice the next verse the next set of verses in 2 Kings 18 look down at verse 14 to 16 so we saw verse 13 snacka comes up against the Fortified cities of Judah verse 14 then Hezekiah king of Judah sent to the king of Assyria at lakish saying I have done wrong withdraw from me whatever you impose on me I will bear so the king of Assyria required of Hezekiah king of Judah 300 talents of silver and 30 talant of gold Hezekiah gave him all the silver which was found in the house of the Lord and in the treasures of the King’s house at that time Hezekiah cut off the gold from the doors of the Temple of the Lord and from the doorpost which Hezekiah king of Judah had overlaid and gave it to the king of Assyria so what does Hezekiah do what that good yeah he’s essentially trying to buy some peace he says I give up whatever you want me to pay you I’ll give you just stop attacking my land could have been a result of or not not simply or probably partly the result of leakes’s fall and the the Brut the brutality that went there went on there but also the loss of the other cities Hezekiah becomes afraid and he tries to make peace with sakib sakam agrees he said just give me a whole bunch of treasure and I’ll leave you alone you may notice however verse 17 what happens right after this you give up all your Treasures to buy peace and then verse 17 says then the king of Assyria sent tarton and rarus and raka from lakish to King Hezekiah with a large army to Jerusalem and they went and came to Jerusalem and they went up they came and stood by the conduit of the upper field which is on the high way of the Fullers the Fuller field so we get the rest of their speech there but basically sakb says I’m going to come conquer you anyways thanks for the treasure I’m still coming to get you it didn’t do any good he still comes after Jerusalem and we actually find evidence of The Siege of Jerusalem also in the archaeological record the Assyrian Siege of Jerusalem this would be around 701 BC in 1969 Nam and avigad discovered in Jerusalem an outer defensive wall section that was built immediately prior to the Assyrian invasion in 701 you can see actually part of the wall existent today that’s that top right picture there the wall was 23t wide and 27 ft High earning the name hezekiah’s broad wall this giant wall was likely built as a counter to Syria’s battering rams those Siege engines that were um punching holes through the walls haste is evident in the walls construction smaller Stones than usual were used probably from homes in Jerusalem you don’t have time to go Quarry stones that you normally would outside the city just break down some homes and put those stones into a new wall this apparently was a common practice for judah’s latter Kings because we see a message consistent with this in Isaiah 22:10 this is not with a serious Invasion this is a different King and this is against the Babylonians but listen what Isaiah 22:10 says then you that’s the king counted the houses of Jerusalem and tore down houses to fortify the wall so this is what you do if you’re in a desperate situation break down some houses fortify that wall that’s what Hezekiah did he also prepared by constructing a key water tunnel he water tunnel in 2 Chronicles 32 we actually let’s turn over there real quick because we’ll look at it look at some other things related to that Passage 2 Chronicles 32 we hear about this strategic Choice regarding Jerusalem’s water that Hezekiah makes the Assyrians are coming he’s trying to make preparations look at verses 1 to 5 in chapter 32 in 2 Chronicles verse one after these acts of faithfulness sakb king of Assyria came and invaded Judah and besieged the Fortified cities and thought to break into them for himself now when Hezekiah saw that sakb had come and that he intended to make war in Jerusalem he decided with his officers and his Warriors to cut off the supply of water from the Springs which were outside the city and they helped him so many people assembled and oh so many people assembled and stopped up all the springs and the stream which flowed through the region saying why should the king of Assyria come and find abundant water and he took courage and he rebuilt all the wall that had been broken down and erected Towers on it and built another outside wall and strengthened the Millow in the city of David and made weapons and shields in great number oh there’s also look down in verse 30 another verse related to this water strategy verse 30 in the same chapter it was Hezekiah who stopped up or who stopped the upper Outlet of the Waters of guihan and directed them to the west side of the city of David and Hezekiah prospered in all that he did so what exactly is Hezekiah doing here what’s being talked about in these verses well in 1838 Edward Robinson discovered a tunnel 1,748 ft long and about 2 feet wide connected to Jerusalem to a place outside of Jerusalem and through which water once flowed you actually can see I know it’s a little bit dark but you can actually see that tunnel still today this water tunnel from going from underneath Jerusalem to outside the city a true Marvel of engineering Hezekiah was somehow able to quickly stop up the guihan spring which was outside of Jerusalem and redirect its water into the city via this tunnel and it flowed into the pool of silom in fact in 1890 some local youths had happened upon a inscription inside this tunnel which earlier excavators had missed now called the silom inscription it’s a Paleo Hebrew inscription that dates to about the 8th Century so this would be right around the time of the siege of the siege of Assyria serious Siege of Jerusalem and here’s what the inscription says the axes were against each other and while three cubits were left to cut and on the day of the tunnel being finished the stone cutter struck each man toward his counter part ax against Axe and flowed water from the source to the pool for 1200 cubits so Hezekiah says I don’t want them to have water when they Siege me I don’t want them to have access to Abundant water outside the city I’m going to divert that water through this underground tunnel into the city that way they don’t have water but we have continual water so great move and it was successful ultimately though hezekiah’s confidence did not rest on his preparations for the city of Jerusalem not in the wall not in the tunnel but in God look a little bit further down to from where we first read back in 2 Chronicles 32 verse 6 to 8 he makes these preparations in the city and then verse six he appointed Military Officers over the people and gathered them to him in the Square at The City Gate and spoke encouragingly to them saying be be strong and courageous do not fear or be dismayed because of the king of Assyria nor because of all the horde that is with him for the one with us is greater than the one with him with him is only an arm of flesh but with us is the Lord Our God to help us and to fight our battles and the people relied on the words of Hezekiah king of Judah this is pretty pretty cool Hezekiah had nothing else that he could rely on at this point but gold had not worked all the other fortified cities of Judah had been captured but rather than submitting to despair or bitterness against God Hezekiah looked to the Lord for deliverance and God Vindicated hezekiah’s Faith sakb as you know famously boasts against God he says who can deliver you from my hand Hezekiah brings this boast before God and he prays along with Isaiah the prophet and then we read this in 2 Chronicles 32 down veres 20 to 22 we we see what God does verse 20 same chapter but King Hezekiah and Isaiah the prophet the son of Amos prayed about this and cried out to heaven and the Lord sent an angel who destroyed every mighty warrior commander and officer in the camp of the king of Assyria so he returned in shame to his own land and when he had entered the Temple of his God some of his own children killed him there with the sword so the Lord saved Hezekiah and the inhabit an of Jerusalem from the hand of sakb the king of Assyria from the hand of all others and guided them on every side so God delivers Hezekiah he delivers the people of Jerusalem he vindicates hezekiah’s faith and he brings shame to sakb sakb has to return home and defeat now sakb certainly tried to save face as best he could I mean he is coming home but he tries to paint it in the best light he doesn’t he doesn’t want to talk about his miraculous and devastating defeat why do I say this well because we have the record from sakb archaeologists in 1830 discovered at sakib’s Palace in Nineveh two inscribed clay prisms the Taylor prism and the prism of sakb it’s what they came to be called these objects are identical they’re both records of the history of Sak’s Reign written in a Cadian C form the objects are dated to 701 BC here’s a picture of one of them I I just find it fascinating the the objects that they choose to inscribe different things on because we’d think I don’t know like a flat piece of paper just write everything on that but no they they get ovals and cylinders and like Tombstone type things and they inscribe records on them I guess that was what they did back then listen to what sakb says in his in these records regarding his invasion of Judah a couple paragraphs here as for Hezekiah the judahite and this is sakb talking here emperor of the of Assyria as for Hezekiah the judahite who did not submit to my yoke 46 of his strong walled cities as well as the small towns in their area which were without number by leveling with battering rams and by bringing up Siege engines and by attacking and storming on foot by mines tunnels and breaches I besieged and took them 200 , 150 people Great and Small male and female horses mules asses camels cattle and sheep without number I brought away from them and counted as spoil Hezekiah himself like a caged bird I shut up in Jerusalem his Royal City I threw up Earthworks against him the one coming out of the city gate I turned back to his misery his cities which I had despoiled I cut off from his land and to matini King of ashdot Patty king of ekron and silly Bell king of Gaza I gave them and thus I diminished his land I added to the former tribute and I laid upon him the surrender of their lands and imposts gifts for my Majesty as for Hezekiah the terrifying Splendor of my Majesty overcame him and the Arabs and his mercenary troops which he had brought in to strengthen Jerusalem his Royal City deserted him in addition to the 30 talents of gold and 800 talant of silver gems antimony Jewels large carnelians Ivory inlaid couches Ivory inlaid chairs elephant SES elephant tusks ebony boxwood all kinds of valuable Treasures as well as his daughters his harm his male and female musicians which he had brought after me to nma my Royal City to pay tribute and to accept servitude he dispatched his Messengers okay now according to this record this makes syap crib’s invasion of Judah sound really successful and it’s mostly true what boast does sakri make in this record that actually based in truth yeah Steve that’s right I put him into Jerusalem like a caged bird what else does he boast he took treasure I took a whole bunch of treasures back now I think he exaggerates a little bit he’s like I even took his Harum I don’t know about that but he certainly did have treasure from Hezekiah remember Hezekiah had sent him tribute he said go away from my land I’ll give you all this gold snack accepts it and then decides to invade Jerusalem anyways but technically he did get tribute from Hezekiah and then of course he also did actually take the other cities of Judah he took the 46 cities of Judah and all the other towns and acquired captives and plunder so those things were all true but what boast does sakb noticeably not make he didn’t take Jerusalem didn’t take Jerusalem you can’t make that boast because you didn’t do it this is significant of course the ACB also doesn’t say anything about his army miraculously being wiped out either now someone might ask well is it possible that his army wasn’t really wiped out that he indeed abandoned Jerusalem after Hezekiah sent him more tribute well just looking historically this is very unlikely because right after trying to Siege Jerusalem Assyria stops all its invasions it no longer tries to invade any other the western territories that makes sense if your army was just d destroyed you’re not able to invade people anymore so what the Bible says we see even from the archaeological evidence and historical evidence that this is true sakb though the Bible talks about sb’s death sakb did not die right away he lived for another 20 years after the failed Siege of Jerusalem but he was indeed killed by one of his sons just as the Bible says we see this actually in a couple different places Babylonian Chronicles and certain Assan records note this here’s one of the inscriptions in one of those places on the 20th day of the month tbet sakb king of Assyria his son slew him in Rebellion esar had and his son sat on the throne of Assyria so there you have it the man who boasted against God was destroyed while the man who waited on the Lord was rescued by God’s Mighty hand we’ll pause there for a second questions about Hezekiah and the Assyrian invasion okay well eventually the Assyrian Empire gave way to the Babylonian Empire the subjugator became the subjugated and the prey became the Predator the Babylonian King nabo palar he led a coalition of Kingdoms to overthrow the Assyrian Empire which proved ultimately successful in 605 BC so he starts this re he lead starts leading this rebellion in 625 BC and successful in taking Nineveh in 605 shortly thereafter naop Pal’s son Nebuchadnezzar Nebuchadnezzar II becomes the ruler of the Babylonian Empire so this is the Nebuchadnezzar of the scriptures Babylon like Assyria before begins to expand he starts moving towards Palestine and the king of Judah jeho Kim subm mits without a fight he says H I’ll serve you you’re a pretty powerful guy I’ll serve you don’t attack me but 3 years later jeho Kim Rebels he decides he’s not going to serve Nebuchadnezzar after all well this is going to bring the neb the wrath of Nebuchadnezzar down on Jerusalem and so he leads an invasion there before he could attack Jerusalem though jeho Kim dies and his son jeho chin becomes king let’s actually read about this in the Bible turn back to Second Kings I’ll look at 2 Kings chapter 24 2 Kings 24 and we’ll look at verses 10 to1 17 now this is the first invasion of Jerusalem there’s another one coming this is the first verse 10 at that time the Servants of Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon went up to Jerusalem and the city came under siege and Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon came to the city while his servants were besieging it jein the king of Judah went out to the king of Babylon he and his mother and his servants and his captains and his officials so the king of Babylon took him captive in the eth year of his Reign he carried out from there all the Treasures of the house of the Lord and the Treasures of the King’s house and cut in pieces all the vessels of gold which Solomon king of Israel had made in the temple of the Lord just as the Lord had said and he led away into Exile all Jerusalem and all the captives and all the Mighty Men of Valor 10,000 captives and all the Craftsmen and the Smiths none remained except the poor people of the land so he led jeho chin away into exile to Babylon also the King’s mother and the King’s wives and his officials and the leading men of the land he led away into Exile from Jerusalem to Babylon all the men of valor 7,000 and the Craftsmen and the Smiths 1,000 all strong and fit for war and these the king of Babylon brought into exile to Babylon then the king of Babylon made his uncle mattaniah King in his place and changed his name to zedekiah so this is the first conquest of Jerusalem many archaeologists date this to 597 BC so this would also be where we would expect Daniel to be taken into captivity I know it’s a little bit different than Usher’s timeline but around 597 BC one of the reasons archaeologists assert this date is because the conquest of Jerusalem this first Conquest is mentioned specifically in the Babylonian Chronicles now what are the Babylonian Chronicles discovered in the 19th century during exovations in Babylon Babylonian Chronicles are a series of K form tablets a whole bunch of tablets descri describing all the important events taking place from 747 BC to 280 BC so really long historical record and a treasure Trove for archaeologists one tablet mentions Nebuchadnezzar’s conquest of Jerusalem here’s what it says year seven in kliv the king of Babylonia called out his army and marched to hatu that is the West he set his Camp against the city of Judah and on the second of Adam he took the city and captured the king he appointed the king of his choosing there took heavy tribute and returned to Babylon exactly what the Bible says also noted in this Babylonian um this Babylonian record we even have a document showing that jehoich chin remained a prisoner in Babylon the beginning of the 20th century Robert cway uncovered a Babylonian administrative document near the Ishtar gate which we’ll talk about in our next class doy turned out to be a food ration list for prisoners specifically judan prisoners and one line reads T Sila of oil to jein King of Judah and to the sons of the king some other oil was given so again we’re seeing multiple pieces of archaeology just confirming and going along with exactly what the Bible says later on jehoich chin as you probably know is released from prison and given better accommodations by one of Nebuchadnezzar’s successors read about this in 2 Kings 25 veres 27-3 you can just glance over there since we’re already there in the Bible verse 27 now it came about in the 37th year of the Exile of jehoich chin king of Judah in the 12th month on the 27th day of the month that evil merido king of Babylon in the year that he became king released jehoich chin king of Judah from prison he spoke kindly to him and set his throne above the the Throne of the Kings who were with him in Babylon joachin changed his prison clothes and had his meals in the king’s presence regularly all the days of his life and for his allowance a regular allowance was given him by the king a portion for each day all the days of his life that of course is a a gracious provision from God a reminder that he doesn’t abandon Israel but jein is taken prisoner zedekiah is put in his place now zedekiah he serves the king of Babylon for a short time and then he also chooses to rebel against Nebuchadnezzar’s rule which means a second invasion is coming and this is the more devastating one here the city of lakish is once again notable in 1935 18 letters were discovered by JL starky in the gate Tower of the ruins of Leakes at T lakish three more letters were discovered in 1938 so the total was 21 21 letters d to around 589 to 588 BC so this would be during the second invasion of Judah now these letters are not letters in the modern sense they’re not notes inscribed on small or they’re not notes on paper they’re notes inscribed on small pieces of pottery which archaeologists call ostraca they didn’t have Post-it notes or scraps of paper back then so they used scraps of pottery instead got a broken piece of pottery just write your note on it and send it with the messenger this is what they did now of these 21 letters these 21 notes not all of them are legible but from what we can read of these notes they’re mostly Communications from a Jewish Commander named hosiah who maned an outpost north of lakish hosiah was apparently charged with the task of passing along signals signals that he saw from or that he received from the city of AA and the City of lakish pass those messages on to a higher ranking officer somewhere else now ASA and lakish were two significant cities in fact Jeremiah 34: 6 to 7 Notes that they were the last two cities standing besides Jerusalem during the second invasion here’s Jeremiah 34:6 to7 then Jeremiah the prophet spoke all these words to zedekiah King of Judah in Jerusalem when the army of the king of Babylon was fighting against Jerusalem and against all the remaining cities of Judah that is lakish and azaka for they alone remained as fortified cities among the cities of Judah so these letters are about these two cities letter four appears to have been written shortly before the fall of lakish here’s the letter May Yahweh cause my Lord to hear this very day Tidings of good and now according to everything that my Lord hath written so hath thy servant done I have written on the door according to all that my Lord hath written to me that is he posted a public message and with respect to what my Lord hath written about the matter of Beth herid there’s no one there as for semiah shemiah hath taken him and brought him to the city and as for thy servant I am not sending anyone thither or I’m not sending anyone thither today but I will send tomorrow morning and let my Lord know that we are watching for the signals of lakish according to all the indications which my Lord hath given for we cannot see azaka if hosiah could no longer See Fire signals from AA what did that probably indicate it had fallen ASA had fallen and lakish was soon to follow yes Dwayne that’s right so it was rebuilt one more time and after this Invasion it’s not rebuilt yeah I don’t know if lakush was totally leveled but it certainly had been conquered so AA falls lakish falls and Jerusalem follows thereafter but this time Nebuchadnezzar is not gracious to the inhabitants of Jerusalem he Slaughters the city’s Nobles he breaks down the city walls he destroys most of the buildings in Jerusalem including the temple and he carries almost all the people into captivity we see this in 2 Kings 258 to12 look over at verse 8 now on the seventh day of the month the seventh day of the fifth month which was the 19th year of King Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon nebuzaradan captain of the Guard a servant of the king of Babylon came to Jerusalem he burned the house of the Lord the King’s house and all the houses of Jerusalem even every great house he burned with fire so all the army of the calans who were with the captain of the Guard broke down the walls around Jerusalem and the rest of the people who were left in the city and the deserters who had deserted to the king of Babylon and the rest of the people nebuzaradan the captain of the Guard carried away into Exile but the captain of the Guard left some of the poorest of the land to be Vine dressers and plowmen by the way you notice the name nebu zeran here sometimes the Bible just seems to cas mention someone’s name or mention a title of a foreign officer or general in the parallel passage to this in Jeremiah we hear about even more Babylonian officials turn over to Jeremiah for a second Jeremiah 39 this is a parallel passage to what we just read Jeremiah 39 look at verses 1 to 3 chapter 39:1 now when Jerusalem was captured in the n9th year of zedekiah king of Judah in the 10th month Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon and all his army came to Jerusalem and laid Siege to it in the 11th year of NE zedekiah in the fourth month in the ninth day of the month the city wall was breached and all the officials of the king of Babylon came in and sat down at the Middle Gate nural SAR ezar samgar Neu sarim the rarus nural sarer the rabag and the rest of the officials of the king of Babylon now what’s interesting about this list is that one of these names has been discovered on a tablet in Babylon called the NEOS sarum tablet discovered in the 1800s near Baghdad was only deciphered in 2007 it was deciphered by a British museum mysteriologist named Michael jersa this 2-in tablet is a receipt for a donation that sarin made to a temple this receip can be dated to 595 BC so before the second invasion of Jerusalem now for clarification sake the name on the receipt which I’m about to show you is a little bit different than what we just read in our nasb text it’s for two reasons one Babylonian names are written a little differently than they are in Hebrew two different translations of the Bible divide up the syllables of these names in different ways for example we saw that nasb uh divides those names into four four people those different syllables into four people but the ESV divides it into three people so we have Nal sarer of the samgar and nebus sarum of rabs sarus that nebu being attached to the following name rather than the one that came before King James version also does it differently we have six names so there’s a little bit of um it’s a little difficult to figure out how many names are meant In this passage but if we take the name nebus sarum and we convert it to its Babylonian equivalent then it lines up perfectly with what we read on this receipt this tablet the nebu sarum tablet here’s what it says regarding 1.5 Minas of gold property of nebu shusu Akin the chief unic which he sent via Arad banatu the unic to the temple isanga arod banatu has delivered it to inanga in the presence of Bel usat son of Alaya the Royal bodyguard and of Nadin son of Marduk zerne month 11 day 18 year 10 of Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon just like a random receipt that’s sh that aligns with one of the names of the Bible you might say well who cares so what well Irving fle the assistant Keeper of the Department of the Middle East at the British museum as some good words remarking on this find he said this is a fantastic Discovery a worldclass find if nubus sarum existed which other lesser figures in the Old Testament existed a throwaway detail in the Old Testament turns out to be accurate and true I think it means that the whole The Narrative of Jeremiah takes on a new kind of power so this is a a curator or this is one of the people at the British museum as far as I know not a Christian but he is marking just about how amazing this is that we have this Minor Detail which is corroborated outside the Bible Bible is indeed true in both the little and the big details God’s spirit has already shown us this but archaeology adds an amen yes Eric oh really wow that’s a it’s good that you have that knowledge I’ll just repeat your comment so the amount of go gold he’s given here at0 75 kilograms Eric says is $25,000 worth of gold by today’s standard so that was a pretty big donation to the temple Pious guy what were you going to say okay wow yeah about 20 ounces of gold big big donation so we see even in this Minor Detail the archaeology confirming and filling out more of what the Bible talks about when it talks about the Babylonian Invasion and the kingdom of Babylon now there’s more that I want to show you about Nebuchadnezzar and his successors but we have to stop there for today well pick up with neb K in a couple of weeks any questions though about the archaeology related to babylon’s conquest of Jerusalem okay next week we get a special treat may have noticed an insert in our bulletin today and also the the note I added to my email we have unique presentation that we’re going to be looking at next week and the week after be watching this award winning documentary patterns of evidence Exodus now I promised you that we would come back and talk about the Exodus and the conquest this documentary shows that while many maintain there is no evidence for the Exodus in archaeology there actually is a lot of evidence amazing evidence but evidence that has been dismissed up to this point by most archaeologists because it doesn’t fit with the assumed chronology that they have in their minds regarding Egypt not only is the evidence so this evidence is presented in this documentary and it’s quite impressive but so also are the interviews I don’t know how he did it but the filmmaker Timothy Mahoney he sits down with some of the most famous archaeologists and professors those who disbelieve the Bible and those who believe the Bible so he gives us a very full perspective he even sits down with the Prime Minister and the president of Israel he interviews both of those guys in this documentary so really quality work really excited to show it to you the film is 2 hours long so we’re going to start the movie very close to 9:30 next week so we can actually watch the whole thing so make sure you come a little bit early let’s actually watch a little preview of the of this documentary this is about three and a half minute clip all right so look forward to that that’s next week and the week after well let’s close in prayer today Lord God I thank you so much that you are sovereign Lord I thank you also that you Lord you confirm again and again that you will be with those who look toward you like the like the the golden serpent that was lifted up God those who look to you were saved Hezekiah looked to you and was saved but his successor his later successor zedekiah he did not look to you and others Kings of Israel they did not look to you and they were destroyed you judge them because of their wickedness oh God we’re encouraged because we know that if we look to you that you will take care of us and ultimately God you’ll take care of us in an eternal sense you’ll bring us to yourself we’ll be with you forever you’ll be our portion you’ll be our reward oh Lord I pray that the people will be encouraged today as they meditate on this truth Lord bless the rest of the service today in Jesus name amen