Ancient Israel's History: An Introduction to Issues and Sources by Ancient Israel's History An Introduction to Issues & Sources

Author:Ancient Israel's History An Introduction to Issues & Sources
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Jews—History—To 70 A.D., REL006090, Bible. Old Testament—Criticism (interpretation, etc.), Bible. Old Testament—History of Biblical events, REL006210
ISBN: 9781441246349
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2014-11-11T00:00:00+00:00

Other sources for assessing possible Judean expansion include Hebrew inscriptions found at Meṣad Hashavyahu, a small fortress on the southern Mediterranean coast.84 Some scholars take these inscriptions as indicating a prominent Judean presence on the coast that suggests expansion and hegemony.85 Others, however, emphasize inscriptions that reveal the presence of Greeks at the fortress. Since Greeks were known to have served in the Egyptian military, some scholars conclude that the settlement was more likely under Egyptian control, with Judean and Greek soldiers in Egypt’s service.86 There is also evidence for the construction of a seventh-century fort at Megiddo, as well as the fortification of the southern cities of Arad and Kadesh-Barnea, each with the presence of Hebrew inscriptions.87 Perhaps these sites indicate a centralized royal building program with expanded reach into northern territory. Yet there is no direct evidence that Judeans built or occupied the fort at Megiddo, and most of the archaeological evidence for growth comes from the Negev, an area in which there was increasing Edomite settlement activity at the time.88 In short, the inscriptional and archaeological evidence for possible Judean expansion is inconclusive, with the meaning of the evidence being largely dictated by the broader scenario into which it is placed.

At the heart of the broader scenario are the sources concerning the role and dominance of Egypt in the waning years of the Assyrian Empire. When does the available evidence suggest that Egypt gained control over the Levant, and does this allow for any period of Judean expansion and/or hegemony under Josiah that would lead one to interpret the local archaeological and inscriptional evidence in that manner? No Egyptian records refer directly to Judah, so historians primarily depend on the Babylonian Chronicles and related inscriptions that provide the general contours of Assyrian, Egyptian, and Babylonian actions in the final decades of the seventh century BCE. We may reasonably assume that such Egyptian hegemony, and thus any Judean resurgence, would have been impossible before Ashurbanipal’s death in 627. Hence, throughout the first half of Josiah’s reign (641–627) the presence of Assyrian governors in the northern territories likely rendered impossible any armed actions by Egypt or by a local Assyrian vassal kingdom like Judah. On the other end of the time frame, Egypt had clear control over Syria-Palestine and its territories by the time of the Battle of Haran in 610, the context in which the Old Testament records Neco II’s ability to move freely through Syria-Palestine and place a vassal king of his choosing on the Judean throne (2 Kings 23:31–35; 2 Chron. 36:1–4).

Is it possible that the Babylonian Chronicle’s indications of Assyria’s decline, Ashurbanipal’s death, and Babylon’s emergence (see above) reveal a window of time between 627 and 610 during which Judah was free from all but nominal imperial hegemony? As noted above, the Babylonian Chronicles have a gap between 623 and 616, so we do not know the circumstances that pertained throughout the region for nearly a decade after Ashurbanipal’s death. If one follows the account

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