“541. TERMS OF SUBMISSION—ISAIAH 36:16-20”
Terms of Submission—Isa_36:16-20
After a great deal of preliminary abuse of the same quality of “coarseness,” which still characterizes even the state language of the East, and which, in this case, was destined to strike fear into the hearts of the troubled Hebrews; Rabshakeh at length comes to deliver in direct language “the words of the great king, the king of Assyria.” He is careful, doubtless for good reasons, to deliver this message in the first person, as the mouth-piece of the king, whose words he brings, and in whose name he speaks; and careful observers may note some essential differences between the tone of this message and that of the preamble by which the boisterous ambassador introduces it. It is more sober, dignified, and quiet. It reasons and persuades rather than threatens; and its purport is to set forth the advantages and necessity of a peaceable submission, and the utter uselessness of opposition. It ends, indeed, in what is to us, and was to those who heard the words, atrocious blasphemy. It evinces that he knew not the Lord, whose power he put, as the heathen were apt to do, on a level with that of other gods, whose votaries he had overcome; but it does show that he knew the almightiness of Jehovah, and defied it.
We may not pass unobserved the title of “the great king,” which the Assyrian general gives to his master—a title which the Jews gave to the Lord only, but which the lords of the great eastern empires were fond of appropriating to themselves. It is in their view equivalent to the other Oriental title of “king of kings,” and in essential significance corresponds to “emperor.” It is likely that the wedge-shaped inscriptions, when they come to be more fully understood, will furnish some curious facts in illustration of the Assyrian practice in the use of high regal titles.
This “great king,” by the mouth of his spokesman, invites the Jerusalemites to “make an agreement with me by a present, and come out to me: and eat ye every one of his vine, and every one of his fig-tree, and drink ye every one of the waters of his own cistern.” This looks very sweet and pleasant; and the uninitiated may be apt to wonder how these intractable Hebrews could resist the proposed amenities and agreeable prospects. Interpreted into plainer language, the invitation loses something of its pleasant color. It means—Come out and submit yourselves to me, acknowledge my authority, abandon your defence, and forego your national liberties, and in testimony thereof come not empty handed, but bring out a handsome tribute, in acknowledgment of the obligations your new relation inspires; and, having thus become my subjects and servants, you shall then not be slain, nor your cities destroyed, but you shall be left for a time in the enjoyment of your substance, and may yet for a time eat to the full of your own food.
The passage shows, moreover, what terms the Assyrians were accustomed to offer to those who submitted to their yoke without resistance; and they are not essentially different from those which invaders have in all ages offered or imposed. The Israelites themselves seem to have offered such terms to all but the doomed nations of Canaan. Perhaps they are as favorable (except as regards the ultimate deportation, to which we shall presently come) as those now offered by European conquerors. Perhaps they are rather more so—as a modern fashion has grown up of making a conquered people pay for the expense of being conquered. However, in connection with this subject, and in remembrance of the treaties formerly contracted with Assyrian monarchs by former kings of Israel and Judah, one of the Sculptured slabs of Nineveh acquires a scriptural interest, as it represents the formation of a treaty of peace of this nature.
Treaty of Peace, from Nineveh Sculptures
In this slab the king has alighted from his chariot to meet on foot, with condescending consideration, the ambassador, or prince of the other contracting party. An eunuch holds the very ancient ensign of royalty—an umbrella—over the king’s head, who retains his bow in his left hand and an arrow in his right hand, which is uplifted in the eastern mode of contracting a solemn engagement. The other party who stands before him has also his right hand raised in like manner. The aspect of this person is that of one who has been brought to terms after an engagement, yet has not been wholly conquered. There is nothing to indicate equality with the king, on the one hand, while on the other, there is no appearance of abased submission. His body is not bent; and he retains his sword by his side, although his hands are empty—indeed his left arm is in a kind of sling, as if to indicate that he had been wounded. Note: The point is differently rendered in engravings; but this is the impression we derive from a narrow inspection of the original marble in the British Museum. And if it be thus rightly interpreted it may be taken as almost a Hogarthian touch on the part of the Assyrian sculptor, for indicating a man’s condition. The man’s arm in a sling, under such circumstances, is the history of a battle. We at first doubted whether this seeming sling might not be a kind of handcuff; but on reflection it appeared that the ancient Oriental handcuffs confined both the hands together; and if one hand were handcuffed, it would surely be the right hand, especially in the case of a man admitted to come before the king with his sword at his left side. He has therefore a wounded arm in a sling; being, we apprehend, the only example in ancient sculpture or painting of such a circumstance.
The “great king,” however, does not deceive the Hebrews into the expectation that their submission will secure them in the permanent possession of their own lands. No; that was not the policy of the eastern conquerors of those ages. They removed nations from one land to another, partly to concentrate valuable populations in places where most needed, and partly with the object of securing submission by the destruction of local associations—the ties of country and home, which form the basis of national patriotism. The king therefore says, that this is only a temporary arrangement, until, after finishing the campaign, he shall return and “take you away;” but this grievous intimation he tries to mollify by informing them, that they will be nothing the worse for their removal, for they will be taken “to a land like your own land.” Like it in what?—like it in being, as Palestine, “a land of corn and wine, a land of bread and vineyards.”
This representation is correct enough. Assyria was the country intended, and this country has, in fact, considerable resemblance to Palestine, in its being a land of mountains and plains—with analogous variations of temperature, and with nearly similar productions from the soil. Taking Assyria as corresponding nearly to the modern Kurdistan, it may be described as a country, the general elevation of which, and the height of its mountain ranges, secures it from the scorching heats to which the people of Mesopotamia are exposed in the very same latitude; while the cheerful vales and the long terraces on the sides of the mountains boast of the green taracanth plants, at the same time that they yield gum and produce the vine, as well as other fruit trees. The forests, in addition to the ash and oriental plane, have the finest walnut trees in great abundance; and the oaks are noted for the quality of their gall-nuts. The honey, which is found in holes under ground, or in hives made of mud, is remarkably fine, as well as very abundant, and it produces a fragrant wax, which is largely exported. In addition to these, the valleys also grow silk, cotton, tobacco, hemp, pulse, wheat, barley, rice, Indian corn, sumach, sesame, and the castor-oil plant. Melons and pumpkins grow to an enormous size, and flowers of all kinds, particularly the gigantic rose, are abundant. When Herodotus says that the Assyrians did not cultivate the vine, the olive, nor the fig, he must either have been mistaken, or have limited his observations to the plains towards Mesopotamia, where the heat of summer is very strong. The vine is actually represented in the sculptures of Nineveh; and, indeed, the testimony of the present text is conclusive as to the corn and the vines.
Autor: JOHN KITTO