1. THE HITTITES BIBLICAL STATEMENTS ABOUT THE HITTITES
IN the first place, we present a summary of what the Bible states concerning this important people. The Scriptures contain more than fifty references to the Hittites; and from these the following facts can be deduced: The Hittites were, at least mainly, neither Japhetic nor Semitic, but Hamitic.
They were a branch of the Canaanites, being descended from Canaan’s second son, Heth.
In Abraham’s time (2000 B. C.) they were an important element in the population of the land of Canaan, and were dominant in the city of Hebron, which was in the southern section of the central highlands.
Hittites (probably) built Hebron about the time of the Hyksos invasion and conquest of Egypt; and the Hyksos invaders built Zoan in Egypt seven years later (see Num. 13:2222And they ascended by the south, and came unto Hebron; where Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the children of Anak, were. (Now Hebron was built seven years before Zoan in Egypt.) (Numbers 13:22)). Hittites seem to have formed a strong contingent of the conquering army.
Four hundred years after Abram, in the time of Moses, the Hittites formed the second strongest branch of the Canaanites in Palestine.
These Hittites came to help the kings of Northern Palestine against Joshua, and shared in their utter defeat (see Josh. 11:1-45).
Thus, according to the Biblical History, the Hittites were a powerful and independent people for well over a thousand years; and powerful Hittite monarchs were ruling within and beyond the borders of North Syria for at least a hundred years from the time of Solomon.
Critical Scorn of the Biblical Statements
Until comparatively recently, in the absence of all other sources of information about the Hittites, the Biblical statements were discredited by the critics, and were actually used against the Bible; the assumption being that no statement of the Bible was to be believed unless it was supported by some outside evidence. Professor SAYCE, to whom was given the privilege of being the first to discover the archaeological facts in regard to the Hittites, has remarked that. the Biblical statements “were set down as undeniable proof of the unhistorical character of the Scriptures. No other ancient literature knew anything of such an Empire, or made any mention of such a people.” It is true that even before the close of the nineteenth century sufficient facts had come to light to render such an unbelieving position untenable; but one leading critic could still venture to declare: “No Hittite king can have compared in power with the King of Judah... nor is there a single mark of acquaintance with the contemporaneous history.”
The Biblical Statements Confirmed
On this confident criticism SAYCE remarks: “It is not the Biblical writer, but the modern author, who is now proved to have been unacquainted with the contemporaneous history of the time.” The discovery and decipherment of the ancient records of the Hittites form one of the most notable achievements of recent archaeology; and the facts discovered (though not always the theories built upon those facts), concerning the Hittite Empire, and its associated peoples, have witnessed to the truthfulness of the Scripture references. Professor GARSTANG, in his 1910 volume on “The Land of the Hittites,” ranks the Scriptures as the most important of the sources for Hittite history. There is still controversy as to whether the Hittites were a Hamitic people. Some obscurity is caused by the fact that certain non-Hittite tribes and peoples, who were associated in the Hittite Empire, are in various records referred to loosely as “Hittites.” Already, however, there are many indications that on this point, as on the others, the Biblical History is about to be entirely vindicated. For the nineteenth century critics of the Bible, manufacturing theories “out of their own heads,” the Biblical references to the Hittites demonstrated the ignorance of the Biblical writers. For the twentieth century archaeologists, these same references constitute the Scriptures the most important of the sources for Hittite history. It seems to take a long time for such facts to become known to the religious world; and sometimes it seems as though they were being suppressed by those whose theories are endangered by the modern discoveries. Our readers therefore have a definite duty and a precious privilege in the passing on to others of these vital facts.
2. ASSYRIA
Assyrian Chronology
The foundations of our knowledge of Assyrian chronology are not so secure as has been generally supposed. One of its main sources is furnished by the “Eponym Lists.” (In these lists each year is named after the king or after some leading official, who have been entitled “Eponyms.”) These Lists were thought to be extremely accurate; and, since they could not always be harmonized with certain Bible statements, the critics of the Bible of course declared that the mistake must lie with the Bible. But further investigation has shaken confidence in the Eponym Lists. One leading Assyriologist is of the opinion that at one point some 46 or 47 years have been dropped out in the Assyrian Lists. Again, in the Eponym Lists, in one year of the reign of Assurdaan an eclipse of the sun is mentioned; and this has been identified with an eclipse which was visible in Assyria in 763 B. C. Professor OPPERT, however, points out that this identification cannot be correct; for in the same List it is mentioned that another eclipse occurred 121 years earlier, and there was no eclipse in that region in 884 B.C. Professor OPPERT declares “In the present state of Assyriological science, we are enabled to show that the Books of Kings are the real basis of our historical knowledge on the subject, and that the pretended cuneiform chronology must bow to the mathematical correctness of the Holy Scriptures.” Further, Professor SAYCE, in comparing two inscriptions, both by Shalmaneser II., remarks: “It may be added that the dates given in the latter inscription do not always agree with those in the one before us; a fact which illustrates the necessity of critical caution even when we are dealing with contemporary documents.” Thus by comparison with other historical records, the faultless accuracy of the Biblical History shines out more and more clearly.
The Fall of Nineveh and of Assyria
A most illuminating inscription has recently been found and deciphered, but has not yet become generally known. It was written by Nabopolassar, the father of Nebuchadnezzar; and it was first published by the University of Chicago in 1927. It throws much fresh light on the great events that occurred just before and just after the death of Josiah, King of Judah. This inscription has quite upset the hitherto accepted account of the fall of Nineveh; but it is found to be in perfect accord with what the Bible says. Nabopolassar relates that in his tenth year (B. C. 616) he attacked Assyria, and that an army of Egypt helped the Assyrians against him. In his eleventh year he renewed the war, being himself helped by the Medes. Three years later (B. C. 612) the combined forces of the Babylonian and the Medes took Nineveh by assault. The Assyrian king, however, escaped, and established himself at Harran, which he made his capital. Nabopolassar in his sixteenth year (B. C. 610) captured Harran; and the Assyrian king fled with the remnant of his army across the River Euphrates. Later in the same year, he re-crossed the river, along with “the great army of Egypt,” and besieged Harran, but could not recapture it, the Babylonian forces within it successfully resisting all attacks.
Now it was in the year 610 B. C., according to the Biblical History, that Pharaoh Necho, marching from Egypt to Carchemish, defeated and slew King Josiah.
The new tablet proceeds to relate that Nabopolassar marched to the relief of his garrison in Harran. From this point there are lacunae in the tablet; but the portions which remain readable show that the Babylonians were completely successful, and continued their victorious campaign as far as Armenia. The wording indicates that at this stage of the war Nabopolassar was no longer with his army; and it is probable that the commander was the crown prince Nebuchadnezzar. It would appear that, at a later stage in this protracted war, the Babylonian army, under Nebuchadnezzar, encountered the Egyptian army at Carchemish on the Euphrates, and inflicted upon Necho and his forces a decisive defeat.
These newly recovered facts enable us for the first time to understand some hitherto misinterpreted Scriptural statements about the military operations of this Egyptian monarch. The usual assumption—held by the critics of the Bible as well as by believers in the Bible—has been that Egypt was allied with Babylonia and Media against Assyria. This is indeed the impression conveyed by the ordinary translation of 2 Kings 23:2929In his days Pharaoh-nechoh king of Egypt went up against the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates: and king Josiah went against him; and he slew him at Megiddo, when he had seen him. (2 Kings 23:29), where a certain Hebrew preposition (‘al) is rendered “against,” although a few words further on it is translated “to.” In the light of the facts revealed by this inscription, it becomes clear (1) that the more correct rendering of this passage is: “In his days Pharaoh Necho king of Egypt went up to be beside the king of Assyria beside the River Euphrates...;” (2) that the phrase used by this Pharaoh and recorded in 2 Chron. 35:2121But he sent ambassadors to him, saying, What have I to do with thee, thou king of Judah? I come not against thee this day, but against the house wherewith I have war: for God commanded me to make haste: forbear thee from meddling with God, who is with me, that he destroy thee not. (2 Chronicles 35:21), namely, “the house wherewith I have war,” refers to the Babylonian royal house, which had been his avowed enemy for over six years.
The Battle in Carchemish
The Bible tells us that Nebuchadnezzar inflicted final defeat upon the Egyptian army some three or four years later, in the fourth year of Josiah’s son; see Jer. 46:22Against Egypt, against the army of Pharaoh-necho king of Egypt, which was by the river Euphrates in Carchemish, which Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon smote in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah. (Jeremiah 46:2), which speaks of “the army of Pharaoh Necho king of Egypt, which was beside the River Euphrates IN Carchemish, which Nebuchadnezzer king of Babylon smote” (Heb.). The date was B. C. 607 or 606.
And now for part of the same story, as unearthed by the spade of the archeologist. Professor C. L. WOOLLEY carried out excavations at Carchemish. He says: “We soon brought to light the ruins of a large private house.... It was clear from the outset that the house belonged to the last days of the city’s existence.... The floor was covered with a thick layer of ashes, and in the ashes lay hundreds of bronze arrowheads, lance-points, and fragments of broken swords. The weapons were most numerous near the doors of the rooms, and here, in the thresholds, one would find the arrowheads bent by the force with which they had struck the stone jambs or the metal binding of the doors. Evidently a desperate fight had been waged from room to room, the defenders gradually weakening, until at last the house had been fired over their heads.” The weapons found were “of Babylonian and Egyptian origin.” What a vivid commentary upon the concise statement of the inspired Word. Among other relics were found “clay seals impressed with the name of Necho himself.”
3. BABYLON
The Royal University
We learn from the Book of Daniel (chap. 1:3-5) that at Babylon there was a royal university with a course of teaching extending over three years, for the training of provincial governors and other important officials of the empire. It is significant that this training lasted for three years, just as did the studies at the far more ancient university at Nippur, of which we have spoken already in chapter 3, p.46. The regulations in the time of Nebuchadnezzar simply carried on the old traditions in this matter as in many other respects.
Nebuchadnezzar, the Builder of Babylon
“The king spake and said, Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom, by the might of my power, and for the honor of my majesty?” (Dan. 4:3030The king spake, and said, Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom by the might of my power, and for the honor of my majesty? (Daniel 4:30)). The archaeologists, who have studied the life and times of Nebuchadnezzar from that king’s own records, are agreed that this speech reveals, with astonishing clearness and brevity and fidelity, both his character and also his most cherished achievement—the rebuilding, enlarging and beautifying of Babylon.
In the fifth century B. C., the Greek historian Herodotus visited this city, and has left us the description of it as he beheld it; and we should remember that by then a century had passed away since the glory of Babylon had begun to fade. He says that the city was surrounded by walls 300 or 350 feet high, and some 80 feet in thickness, composing a square, each side almost fifteen miles in length. Piercing these tremendous walls were “a hundred gates all of brass, with brazen lintels and side-posts.” Through the midst of the city the broad Euphrates flowed. Says one recent writer (J. A. BRENDON): “Babylon was not a city as we think of cities today, not a place where men lived herded in narrow streets and gloomy Squares. Its gorgeous temples, palaces, and halls stood in stately parks. There were great hunting grounds in its midst.” The dwellings of the people had palm groves, orchards, and small plots of cornland.
The chief glory of Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon was the royal palace, with its famous “Hanging Gardens;” terrace rising above terrace, balcony upon balcony. It was erected “on one side of the river, in a circular space surrounded by a lofty wall;” and it formed a “central and commanding object.” It was the only building in Babylon “in which hewn stone was used to any considerable extent;” for stones lad to be brought from great distances, there being po source of supply in the Babylonian plains. This portion of the royal palace “occupied a square, with a circuit of rather more than a quarter of a mile.” It comprised “a series of wide, stone terraces, supported by arches, and rose, like a giant stairway, to a height of 350 feet, the whole structure being strengthened by a surrounding wall 20 feet thick. On each of the terraces was a layer of mold so deep as to make it possible not only for plants and flowering shrubs to grow, but fruit-bearing trees as well.
“The gardens were irrigated by means of hydraulic pumps which raised water to a reservoir on the highest terrace. On top of the numerous arches the builders laid reeds and bitumen, and above these, thick sheets of lead. This served to prevent moisture from the soil leaking through and so damaging the spacious and superbly decorated apartments constructed in the vaulted spaces between the arches below. A wide flight of steps ascended from each terrace to the one above” (J. A. BRENDON, in “Wonders of the Past”).
Just recently (1932) the Oxford Field Expedition, making excavations at the palace-site, found among the ruins “a luxurious swimming pool, 45 by 36 feet, lined with brick, and planned on a water system very similar to present-day methods. Constant fresh water was supplied by means of a ‘circulatory system,’ and by careful adjustment could be kept at the required depths.”
The modern archaeologists, carefully reconstructing from their discoveries the picture of the ancient glories of Babylon, find in the language of the Bible the most appropriate wording by which to express their admiration of those glories. The critics of the Bible have suffered no heavier defeat than that which has befallen them in their attack upon the Book of Daniel. One recent writer thus speaks of the “Higher Critical” theory that the Book of Daniel was a pious forgery composed by some Jew in Palestine in the early part of the second century B.C.: “If any man say that this could have been done by a forger writing four centuries after the events, when two empires and civilizations had overlaid and blotted out the Babylonian, we despair of changing opinions which refuse to be affected by the most stupendous facts. When Herodotus visited Babylon, only one hundred years after the great king’s death, Nebuchadnezzar, even for an inquiring Greek traveler, was not even a name in the city that he had built. The Greek traveler heard nothing of him. And yet it is supposed that a Palestinian Jew, writing after other two centuries had deepened the oblivion, could so recall the past, that this man should be set before us just as he lived and thought and spoke” (Rev. J. URQUHART, in “The New Biblical Guide”).
Belshazzar, the King
In the matter of the Scriptural references to Belshazzar, the critics of the Bible felt very sure of their ground. Outside the Bible, no king of this name seemed to be known to any ancient writer on Babylonian history. The last Babylonian king, according to those writers, was named Nabonadius or Nabonidus; and this was confirmed by the Babylonian monuments, which gave his correct name as Nabonahid. Further, he did not die when Babylon was captured, nor was he there at the time; nor was he a son or a grandson of Nebuchadnezzar. In all these respects the Biblical History was impugned. However, one discovery followed another on this subject, even before the close of the nineteenth century. By then it was well-known, from Babylonian inscriptions, that Belshazzar was the eldest son of Nabonahid, and was referred to by him as “the delight of my heart;” that he had been appointed as commander-in-chief of the army; and that he was killed in Babylon on the night when that city was captured by Cyrus.
More recent discoveries have brought further tribute to the accuracy of the Biblical History. In 1915 Dr. PINCHES noted that on a business tablet from Erech there was registered an oath taken in the joint names of Nabonahid the king and Belshazzar the king’s son, this indicating clearly a co-regency. Then in SIDNEY SMITH’S “Babylonian Historical Texts,” 1924, there is published the content of a tablet from Babylon, which states that Nabonahid, when about to set out on a military expedition to “Tema in Amurru” (see Job 6:1919The troops of Tema looked, the companies of Sheba waited for them. (Job 6:19); Isa. 21:1414The inhabitants of the land of Tema brought water to him that was thirsty, they prevented with their bread him that fled. (Isaiah 21:14); Jer. 25:2323Dedan, and Tema, and Buz, and all that are in the utmost corners, (Jeremiah 25:23)), raised Belshazzar to co-regency: “He loosed his hands; he entrusted to him the sovereignty.” It is evident that when Belshazzar, terrified, and willing to promise anything he could grant, offered to Daniel only the third place in the kingdom (Dan. 5:16, 2916And I have heard of thee, that thou canst make interpretations, and dissolve doubts: now if thou canst read the writing, and make known to me the interpretation thereof, thou shalt be clothed with scarlet, and have a chain of gold about thy neck, and shalt be the third ruler in the kingdom. (Daniel 5:16)
29Then commanded Belshazzar, and they clothed Daniel with scarlet, and put a chain of gold about his neck, and made a proclamation concerning him, that he should be the third ruler in the kingdom. (Daniel 5:29)), he himself was already sharing the throne with another. Belshazzar was descended from Nebuchadnezzar, not through his father Nabonahid, but through his mother.
It becomes increasingly manifest that, in answer to the nineteenth century attacks upon the Bible, the God of the Bible has been furnishing, through the startling recent discoveries in Bible lands, a wonderfully full and detailed and crushing reply.
In Conclusion
Marvelous Accuracy of the Bible
Before closing our review of this subject, we would place before our readers several important considerations relating to the whole field of Old Testament research. We do so in words of Professor R. D. WILSON, an authority of worldwide reputation, taken from his 1920 volume on “A Scientific Investigation of the Old Testament.”
The Test of Language
“Now if the Biblical History be true, we shall expect to find Babylonian words in the early chapters of Genesis and Egyptian words in the later; and so on down, an ever-changing influx of new words from the languages of the ever-changing dominating powers. And, as a matter of fact, this is exactly what we find. Thus, the first chapters of Genesis contain proper and common names of Sumerian or Babylonian origin, and the Pentateuch has many Egyptian words. In the time of Solomon, whose mother had been the wife of Uriah the Hittite, and whose commerce included products from all countries, and whose empire extended from the Euphrates to the border of Egypt, we find in the narrative, words of Hittite, Indian, and Assyrian origin. In the documents from the eighth to the sixth century we find predominantly foreign words of Syrian, Assyrian, and Babylonian character. And in the records from the sixth century to the end we find Babylonian, Persian, and a few Greek words” (pp. 89-90). We need hardly point out how this fact completely overthrows the theories of “Higher Criticism,” whose advocates have tried to reverse entirely the traditional beliefs as to the order in which the Books of the Bible appeared.
Faultless Accuracy of Spelling
Professor WILSON remarks that “every one of the 22 consonants composing the names of the kings of Persia mentioned in the Bible has been transmitted correctly to us over a space of 23 or 24 hundred years. It may be added that in no other non-Persian document are they so accurately transliterated” (p. 79). Again, reviewing in this matter the whole field, he says: “Thus we find that in 143 cases of transliteration from Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian and Moabite into Hebrew and in 40 cases of the opposite, or 183 in all, the evidence shows that for 2300 to 3900 years the text of the proper names in the Hebrew Bible has been transmitted with the most minute accuracy. That the original scribes should have written them with such close conformity to correct philological principles is a wonderful proof of their thorough care and scholarship; further, that the Hebrew text should have been transmitted by copyists through so many centuries is a phenomenon unequaled in the history of literature” (pp. 81, 82).
Unexampled Accuracy as to Kings and Dynasties
“The names of these kings—about forty in all—are the names of men who lived from about 2000 to 400 B. C., and yet they each and all appear in proper chronological order both with reference to the kings of the same country and with respect to the kings of other countries contemporary with them.... When we consider that there are nine distinct lines of kings in the countries mentioned, and that there are several hundred kings in all, and that the length of the reigns of the kings could be determined only from the most accurate records, the chance of anyone who did not have access to reliable sources to get a record as exact as that preserved for us in the Hebrew Scriptures would be so small that no mathematician on earth could calculate it” (pp. 86, 87).
Finally
We have endeavored to review in brief compass a subject of vast dimensions. It is difficult to keep pace with the amazingly rapid and brilliant achievements of recent archaeological discovery and research; but we trust that in the preceding pages there has been given a sufficiently full summary of the results at present available. One fact is full of happy significance. While a very great number of confirmations of the truthfulness of the Biblical History have emerged, and while in some cases the arch2eological results have guided us into a fuller understanding of the sacred words, not a single tested result of the discoveries and researches has proved to be contradictory to that History.
It is of special significance that those portions of the Biblical History which were most attacked have been the very portions which the modern investigations have most fully illustrated and confirmed.
The discoveries have come from so wide a range of time and space, and the researches have been so thorough, and the confirming of the Biblical History has been so constant, that we may with all assurance predict that the future results of archeology will but add to the already multitudinous proofs of the veracity of the Divine Record.