Assyrian and Biblical Chronologies Are They Reliable? 3
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Assyrian and biblical chronologies are they reliable ? Gerard Gertoux To cite this version: Gerard Gertoux. Assyrian and biblical chronologies are they reliable ?. 4th Oxford Postgraduate Conference in Assyriology 2015, Apr 2015, Oxford, United Kingdom. hal-03207471v2 HAL Id: hal-03207471 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-03207471v2 Submitted on 1 Jun 2021 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Assyrian and biblical chronologies are they reliable1 ? Gérard Gertoux Abstract: The Assyrian chronology of the 1st millennium BCE is well established, especially for the period 912-609 BCE (Pruzsinsky: 2009, 17), but it is difficult to determine whether there were overlapping reigns due to possible co-regencies (Hagens: 2005, 23-41). Assyriologists have assumed that there were no co-regencies among the Assyrian reigns. Based on this assumption, Edwin R. Thiele, in his 1943 thesis (published in 1951), established a chronology of the Hebrew kings, relying on the numerous synchronisms with the Assyrian kings. However, he encountered a difficulty because several of the required synchronisms exhibited gaps ranging from 10 to 45 years. He solved this problem by assuming the existence of nine co-regencies among the Hebrew reigns (Thiele: 1951, 173-177). Despite this arbitrary choice, which destroys the chronological coherence of the Hebrew reigns (Hughes: 1990, 264-266), Thiele’s chronology still serves as a reference for scholars. However, a careful examination of these synchronisms between Assyrian and biblical chronologies shows that there were several co-regencies among the Assyrian reigns, which they have been correctly dated in the biblical chronology, such as those of Sennacherib and Tiglath-Pileser III. These kings played a crucial role in Israel's history during their co-regencies, such as Sennacherib's campaign in Judah (his 3rd) with the siege of Lachish and Jerusalem, which took place in 712 BCE during the 10th campaign of Sargon II (722-705) with whom he was co-regent during the years 715 to 705 BCE. This agrees exactly with the biblical account stating that all these events occurred during the 14th year of Judean King Hezekiah (726-697) also dated 712 BCE (2Ki 18:13-17; 2Ch 32:9; Is 20:1; 36:1). Similarly, the Israelite king Menahem (771-760) had to pay a tribute (in 765 BCE) to an Assyrian king Pul (2Ki 15:19-20). The Assyrian word pulu, from apil/aplu, means “the heir (i.e., crown prince)”. King Pul(as) reigned 36 years, according to Josephus (Jewish Antiquities IX: 283-287), which corresponds exactly to the Assyrian king Pulu (co-regent) known by his Aramaic name Bar-Ga’yah “Son of the Majesty” who reigned from 782 to 746 BCE. CHRONOLOGY OF ASSYRIAN REIGNS OVER THE PERIOD 912–609 BCE Assyrian chronology may be reconstructed over the period 912–609 BCE using the list of Assyrian eponyms anchored on the total solar eclipse dated 15 June 763 BCE, which occurred on [30] Simanu (month III) in the eponymy of Bur-Sagale. The Assyrian period 912–648 BCE is dated based on its canonical eponyms (Parpola: 2007, 381–430) and the period 648–609 BCE by a prosopography of its eponyms (Parpola: 1998, XVIII-XX) but their ranking remains controversial (Novotny, Jeffers: 2018, 30-32). The chronological reconstruction of the Assyrian reigns based on eponyms is different from that given in the Assyrian King List (table below): TABLE 1 BCE ASSYRIAN KING According to years of reign (AKL) BABYLONIAN KING 630 Aššurbanipal (669–627) 39 18 Kandalanu 629 40 19 628 41 20 627 42 0 21 626 Aššur-etel-ilâni (627–626) 1 0 0 22 625 Sin-šar-iškun (626–612) 1 1 Nabopolassar 624 2 2 BCE ASSYRIAN KING According to eponyms BABYLONIAN KING 630 Aššurbanipal Salmu-šarri-iqbi? 39 0 18 Kandalanu 629 Aššur-etel-ilâni Nabû-šarru-uṣur? 1 [40] 19 628 Nur-salam-sarpi? 2 [41] 20 627 Marduk-šarru-uṣur? 3 [42] 0 21 626 Iqbi-ilani? /Marduk-remanni? 4 0 0 [1] Sin-šum-lišir 625 Sin-šar-iškun Sin-šarru-uṣur? 1 1 Nabopolassar 624 Kanunaiu? 2 2 The presence of co-regencies modifies the dating of synchronisms. For example, in the conventional Assyrian King List (AKL) there is a synchronism between Year 1 of the Assyrian king Aššur-etel-ilâni (627–626) and Year 22 of the Babylonian king Kandalanu in 626 BCE, but in fact this synchronism occurs between Year 1 of Aššur- etel-ilâni and Year 19 of Kandalanu in 629 BCE. The three years of co-regency between Aššur-etel-ilâni (630-626) and Aššurbanipal (669-627), according to the AKL, are therefore artificial (Aššurbanipal became senile or died in 631 BCE?), which modifies the dating of the synchronisms during this period. Consequently, King lists can be used to date synchronisms as long as the presence of co-regencies does not modify the chronology of the reigns. 1 A short report of this paper was presented in Oxford, at Wolfson College, on Saturday 25 April 2015 in the Oxford Postgraduate Conference in Assyriology (https://oxfordassyriology.wordpress.com/opca-2015-programme/). An abstract has been published (https://oxfordassyriology.wordpress.com/gerard-gertoux-university-of-lyon-2/). ORCID http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5916-0445 2 THE SIEGE OF LACHISH BY SENNACHERIB: 712 BCE (BIBLE) OR 701 BCE (AKL)? The traditional date of 701 BCE for Sennacherib's campaign in Judea is accepted by all historians without any significant controversy. During this campaign, there was the siege of Lachish, depicted on the walls of his palace (now visible in the British Museum) as well as the siege of Jerusalem and the battle of Eltekeh, which are described in his annals and dated during his 3rd campaign, in 701 BCE because it is assumed that Sennacherib (705-681) did not campaign during his first year of reign, in 704 BCE (Villard: 2001, 767-769). However, this calculated date is hypothetical as it does not appear in any Assyrian document and the capture of Lachish is not even mentioned in the annals of Sennacherib. Moreover, this hypothetical date is contradicted by several documents that fix this famous campaign in 712 BCE: for example, in the chronicle of Sargon II (722-705) the capture of Ashdod and the battle of Eltekeh are dated during the 10th year of his reign, in 712 BCE. Similarly, this campaign is abundantly described in the Bible. For example, the capture of Lachish by Sennacherib (during his 3rd campaign) and the siege of Jerusalem are both dated in the 14th year of Judean King Hezekiah (726-697), in 712 BCE (= 726 - 14). Similarly, the battle of Eltekeh led by Nubian co-regent Taharqa under the leadership of King Shabataka (712-689), with the probable disappearance of the Egyptian king Osorkon IV (Sô in the MT, Segor in the LXX), is dated during his 1st year of reign in 712 BCE. The biblical account states that all these events occurred during the 14th year of Judean King Hezekiah dated 712 BCE (2Ki 18:13-17, 19:9; 2Ch 32:9; Is 20:1, 36:1, 37:9). This paradox has been masked because Assyriologists use the biblical chronology of Edwin R. Thiele who shifted the reign of Hezekiah (715-686) to coincide with his 14th year occurring in 701 BCE (= 715 - 14). Although he was a competent religious man, Thiele believed that the biblical text was imbued with Babylonian myths and that its chronology needed to be revised on the Assyrian chronicles. To date the many synchronisms between the biblical and Assyrian chronologies he arbitrarily invented nine co-regencies among the Judean and Israelite reigns because he believed in the dogma of the absence of co-regencies in the Assyrian reigns (Thiele: 1951, 173-177). The calculated reign of Hezekiah (715-686), according to Thiele's biblical chronology, gives rise to several insoluble inconsistencies: this chronology destroys the biblical synchronisms between the kings of Israel and Judah (Tetley: 2005, 91-185); the numerous inconsistencies make it unusable to establish a reliable chronology (Hughes: 1990, 264-266). The method for establishing the chronology of the kings of Israel and Judah is therefore erroneous, it is first necessary to establish an unmodified biblical chronology, then to verify if this chronology agrees with Assyrian or Babylonian synchronisms anchored on absolute dates based on astronomy. The durations of the reigns come from the biblical text (Masoretic Text), the names in bold are those that appear in the Assyrian and Babylonian annals, and the parts highlighted in gray correspond to synchronisms. King of Judah Reign MT King of Israel Reign MT Reference David 1057-1017 40 2Sa 5:4 Solomon 1017-977 40 1Ki 11:42 Rehoboam 977-960 17 000 Jeroboam I 10/977 - Ezk 4:5-6 Abiyam 960-957 3 -05/955 22 1Ki 14:20-21 Asa 957 - 41 Nadab 06/955-05/954 2 1Ki 15:10,25 Baasha 06/954-04/931 24 1Ki 15:28,33 Elah 05/931-04/930 2 1Ki 16:8 Zimri 05/930 7 d 1Ki 16:10-16 Omri/ 06/930-05/919/ 12 1Ki 16:21-23 -916 [Tibni] [06/930-01/925] 6 Jehoshaphat 916 - 25 Ahab 06/919-01/898 22 1Ki 16:29 -891 Ahaziah 02/898-01/897 2 1Ki 22:51 Jehoram J.