year of Ahaz, his successor. The tumults following Hoshea's usur- a.m. 3274. pation not allowing him firmly to seat himself immediately upon the B.C. 730. throne, it was not until eight years afterwards that he wholly established himself, and is, therefore, by a subsequent account, said to begin to reign in the twelfth year of Ahaz. Considerations of this Chronological nature are necessary to reconcile certain apparent differences between differences. the books of Kings and Chronicles, but cannot be in every instance noted as we proceed in the narrative. Uninstructed by all the calamities of his predecessors, he followed their idolatrous practices, Hoshea's although not to the same extent with some of them; and in his days the captivity of Israel took place. 2 vices. Israel. Egypt. neser. The ostensibe cause of this captivity was, that Shalmaneser having A.M. 3281. invaded Israel in an early part of the reign of Hoshea, that monarch B.C. 723. bought him off by presents, and declared himself tributary to the Captivity of king of Assyria. But some years afterwards, the king of Israel secretly conspired against him; and having solicited the assistance of So, king of Egypt, withheld the annual tribute from Assyria. So So, king of is called Setho by Herodotus, and Sabachon by Diodorus Siculus, and is the celebrated potentate who deposed and murdered Boccharis, A.M. 3283. king of Egypt, and seized upon the empire. The revolt of Hoshea B.c. 721. coming to the knowledge of Shalmaneser, he advanced against ShalmaSamaria with a powerful army, besieged it, and led its monarch and his people into captivity. Thus terminated the Israelitish monarchy, according to Josephus, "947 years after the departure from Egypt; 800 years from the days of Joshua, and 240 years 7 months, after they had revolted from Rehoboam, to which we may add seven centuries before Christ. It commenced in the days of Pekah, and terminated with the reign of Hoshea. The people were transported into Assyria, Media, and Persia; and other nations out of Cuthath, Ava, Hamath, and Sepharvaim, were planted in Samaria and the possessions of the Israelites. These are the Samaritans against Samaritans. whom the Jews bore particular hatred, and who did not fail to return it. They blended some of the observances of the Jews with the idolatrous rites of their own countries. When the Jews were in prosperity, they were willing to be thought allied to them, but in their adversity always disowned them. They thus availed themselves of the favour which Alexander showed to the Jews, when he visited them, and professed to spring from Ephraim and Manasseh, the sons of Joseph. This mutual hatred burned with inextinguishable fury in the days of our Lord; so that 700 years had produced no reconciliation. Menander, the historian, when he wrote his chronology, and translated the Tyrian chronicles into the Greek language, bore testimony to the existence, the power, and the enterprising disposition of Shalmaneser.4 3 The most remarkable circumstance attending the captivity of 2 Jos. Antiq. Jud. Lib. IX. Cap. 14. S. H. 3 Ib. Lib. XI. Cap. 8. 4 Menand. apud Joseph. Antiq. Jud. Lib. IX. Cap. 14. S ten tribes. A.M. 3283. Israel, is the loss of the ten tribes; we hear nothing more respectB.C. 721. ing them, excepting the remnant of them who returned with Judah Loss of the and Benjamin from Babylon. Josephus and St. Jerome suppose them to be absorbed in the nations among whom they were scattered. This appears also to be the prevailing opinion. Others have objected the positive terms in which a restoration of them is predicted by Amos and Hosea. It has been answered, that these prophecies were accomplished in the restoration of the remnant and the Levites with Judah. Some considerable modern writers have maintained their separate, and even their present existence; and pointed out different spots where traces of them are supposed to be found. We have probably yet to receive from the East much light on this subject, and cannot now pretend to decide, or even to discuss, the question; but we may remark, that the very obscurity into which they have dwindled, if they exist at all, is the result of their separation from the line of the Messiah, which took place when they voluntarily resigned their interest in the house of David. We have other memorable instances of a similar righteous retribution in the government of the world; and it is evident that much of the distinction of the Jews in particular depended upon this connection. CHAPTER IX. THE ISRAELITISH MONARCHY. FROM THE CAPTIVITY OF THE TEN TRIBES TO THE CAPTIVITY OF B.C. 643 TO B.C. 588. WE closed the narrative of the history of God's chosen people, in our last chapter, at the gloomy period of the captivity of the ten tribes. reign. In the meanwhile Hezekiah had ascended the throne of Judah, A.M. 3278. and was applying himself, with pious zeal, to the destruction of B.C. 726. idolatry, and the reformation of his people. He opened and Hezekiah's repaired the temple, sanctified the Levites, offered sacrifices, proclaimed a solemn passover, to which he invited the Israelites with His piety. his own people; ordered the courses of the priests and Levites; made provision for public service; appointed proper officers to superintend and apply the offerings, and restored the worship of Jehovah in its purity throughout his dominions. The most memorable events of his reign are—the invasion of Sen- A.M. 3291. nacherib, king of Assyria, whose army was miraculously destroyed; B.C. 713. the sickness of Hezekiah, from which he was miraculously recovered; fifteen years being added to his life, accompanied by an extraordinary sign in the retrogression of the shadow on the dial of Ahaz, fifteen degrees; the complimentary visit of the envoys from Babylon, to whom, in the elation of his mind, he showed all his treasures, and for which he was censured, and their future capture by the Babylonians foretold; but, as these are particularized in the life of the prophet ISAIAH, in the succeeding chapter, they are slightly glanced at here; and it is only necessary to add, that after an honourable and useful career, he died in the fifty-fourth year of his age, and the twenty-ninth of his reign; and was buried with great distinction, lamented by all his people. Manasseh, who succeeded him at the age of twelve years, was A.M. 3306. far unlike his father; his first work was to undo all that his pious B.C. 698. ancestor had effected, and to overthrow whatever he had established. Manasseh's He restored idolatry, and added to it the most infamous rites; his reign. reign was so oppressive and tyrannical, that he was said to "fill Jerusalem with blood." This career of wickedness was terminated wicked A.M. 3327. by his being surprised and taken prisoner by the king of Assyria; B.C. 677. who carried him into Babylon, (which city he had captured about six years before, reigning sole monarch over the Assyrians and Babylonians,) and cast him into a dungeon. Solitude and suffering Repentance. brought reflection and repentance, and he returned to the God of his father with his whole heart, who vouchsafed him a happy A.M. 3361. emancipation from his bondage. Upon his restoration to his kingB.C. 643. dom, he cleansed it from the idolatry which he had introduced; repaired and fortified Jerusalem, and died in peace, in the sixtyseventh year of his age, after a long reign of fifty-five years. Amon. Josiah. His early piety. He was succeeded by his son Amon, of whom nothing is recorded, A.M. 3363. but that he adopted the evil practices of his father, without sharing B.C. 641. his repentance. He was killed by his own servants, after having held the sceptre only two years. The conspirators were put to death by the people, who had taken no share in the rebellion; but when they had avenged the death of their murdered sovereign, placed his son Josiah, then a child of eight years old, upon the throne of his ancestors. No sooner did this amiable monarch arrive at an age when he could think and act for himself, than he effected A.M. 3374. a complete reformation in his kingdom. In the eighth year of his B.C. 630. reign, and sixteenth of his age, he sought the Lord; and in the twelfth year of his reign, or twentieth of his age, he began to remove the monuments of idolatry, and ceased not until he had destroyed them: a work, however, which occupied him many years A.M. 3383. fully to accomplish. In the eighteenth year of his reign, he repaired B.C. 612. the temple; and the book of the law was found, and read to the king; who, deeply affected at its contents, sent to Huldah, the prophetess, by whom the threatened judgments were confirmed; yet, she added, that on account of the piety of Josiah, he should be exempt from sharing them, and they should not take place until after he was gathered to his fathers. The youthful monarch assembled his people, and caused the law to be read to them; appointed a passover, and restored the services of the sanctuary. He then proceeded with renovated zeal to extinguish the remains of idolatry; in the prosecution of which holy service, he came to the altar of Bethel, and fulfilled a prediction delivered centuries before, in taking the bones of Jeroboam's priests out of their sepulchres, and burning them upon it, while the ashes of the man of God who had foretold its destruction remained undisturbed. In the midst of this active zeal, Pharaoh-necho, king of Egypt, warred against the king of Assyria; and Josiah, considering himself under some engagement to the Assyrian monarch, notwithstanding the Egyptian king endeavoured to dissuade him from meddling in the affair, withstood Pharaoh-necho, and was so severely wounded in the battle, that he died upon his return to Jerusalem, and was buried with lamentations, in which the prophet Jeremiah bore a distinguished part. His son Jehoahaz succeeded him, but reigned only three months; The reformation. Jeboahaz. a space sufficient, however, to show how unlike he was to his pious A.m. 3394. father. The king of Egypt, who had triumphed over Josiah, set B.C. 610. aside Jehoahaz, and placed his brother Eliakim upon the throne; whose name he changed to Jehoiakim, taking the deposed monarch Jehoiakim. with him to Egypt, where he held him prisoner until he died. The monarchy of Judah was now fast hastening to extinction. Jehoia kim held his crown of Pharaoh-necho at a heavy tribute: but a new and illustrious opponent appeared in the person of NEBUCHADNEZZAR, who also rendered him tributary for three years, after which he rebelled, and in his resistance originated those calamities which terminated in the captivity of the Jews. After a reign of eleven A.M. 3405. years of misery and violence he died, leaving the sceptre in the B.C. 599. hands of his son Jehoiachin, who held it only three months, during Jehoiachin. which he discovered the same evil tendencies with his father, and at the close of which he was displaced, and carried captive into Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar, who made Zedekiah, the brother of Zedekiah. the deposed monarch, king of Judah. Even the terrible calamities A.M. 3411. he had witnessed had no influence upon the new sovereign, who B.C. 593. followed the same evil course with his immediate predecessors. At length he also rebelled against the king of Babylon, to whom he Rebels had sworn allegiance, and who now sent and destroyed Jerusalem, t slew the princes of the royal house in sight of their miserable father, Babylon. whose eyes he afterwards put out, and thus finally overthrew the Jewish monarchy, which terminated in Zedekiah, whom he imprisoned in Babylon, where he died. against the Judah. Such was the captivity of Judah, of which the following is a brief A.M. 3416. review, rendered necessary to bring together events which were drawn B.C. 588. out through three reigns. It was commenced by Nebuchadnezzar, Captivity of and completed by his general Nebuzar-adan. The interval between the first devastation of Jerusalem by the king of Babylon, and its total overthrow by his servants, was about twenty-two years. It was begun in the reign of Jehoiakim, 606 years before Christ. Nebuchadnezzar took the city on the 12th day of the 9th month, called Casleu, which answers to our November, and is still observed by the Jews as an annual fast, in remembrance of this event. Among the captives of this first invasion were DANIEL, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah; called in Babylon, Belteshazzar, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego. The interval between the commencement and the consummation of the destruction of Jerusalem is crowded with important transactions; some of which are recorded by Jeremiah, and others by Daniel. The reading of the roll of Jeremiah pronouncing these judgments before Jehoiakim, who was not rendered sensible of his wickedness by the first desolation of his country, excited the most infuriate emotions, and, having first cut it in pieces with his own hand, he threw it into the fire. The Jews kept also the 29th day of Casleu a fast, in memory of the impiety of the monarch by whom this important writing was destroyed. |