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Chapter 3 : Were All the People of the Northern Kingdom Deported? |
Many
scholars have challenged the Bible's claim that the entire population of the northern
kingdom went into Assyrian captivity. Some think most of the Israelites fled south
and assimilated into the population of the kingdom of Judah. What really happened?
Let's examine the record.
The chain of events leading to Israel's fall and massive deportation began with the
Assyrian monarch Tiglath-pileser III. In three campaigns he implemented what historians
call the Galilean captivity (ca. 734-732 B.C.). He captured Damascus and established
a military presence at the border of Egypt. He deported into the upper Mesopotamian
River valley large segments of the Reubenite, Gaddite and Transjordan Manassite populations
(1Chronicles 5:26) and Naphtali and cities in the territories of Issachar, Zebulun
and Asher (2Kings 15:29).
The Assyrian monarch Shalmaneser V initiated and carried out most of the climactic
724-722 B.C. campaign into the remainder of the northern kingdom. Shalmaneser, however,
"was deposed soon afterwards by another king, Sargon II. This name, 'True King,'
seems to betray the suspect nature of Sargon's claim to the throne ... Sargon II
moved the Assyrian capital to his own foundation of Khorsabad, built in imitation
of Nimrud, and the older city was neglected ... Shalmaneser V ... did not have time
to commemorate his achievements in stone, and it was his successor, Sargon II, who
claimed credit for the victory" (Julian Reade, Assyrian Sculpture, pp.
48, 65).
The landmark 19th-century discoveries of British archaeologist Austen Henry Layard
dispelled any doubts that the Assyrian kingdom was a formidable force that ferociously
dominated the ancient Near East off and on from the ninth through the seventh centuries
B.C. It is indisputable that the Assyrians invaded and conquered the northern kingdom
as part of that domination.
The precise figures involved, at least those outside the biblical record, are still
beyond historical verification. Some scholars argue that only a small number of leaders-the
northern intelligentsia-fell into captivity at the hands of the Assyrians. The rest,
they say, either fled as refugees or were assimilated into the alien populations
transplanted in the northern kingdom (2Kings 17:24).
Others believe that the enslavement and removal of Israelites involved almost the
entire northern population. How are we to know who is correct? How many Israelites
did the Assyrians deport?
Archaeologists have found a set of Assyrian court records that provide some specific
numbers. King Sargon II claims to have taken 27,290 captives from Samaria. This number
is decidedly small in contrast to the entire population of the northern kingdom.
But there is a logical reason for such a small number.
Conservative Bible scholar Eugene Merrill notes that Shalmaneser V "took Samaria
in his last year ... (then) Sargon, who probably was not the son of Tiglath-pileser,
as some claim, but a usurper, reigned over the vast Assyrian Empire from 722 to 705.
One of Assyria's most militant rulers, (Sargon) claims to have undertaken significant
campaigns in every one of his seventeen years. In the annals of his first year he
takes credit for Samaria's fall. In actual fact the biblical assertion that Shalmaneser
V was responsible is correct; as several scholars have shown, Sargon claimed this
major conquest for his own reign so that the record of his first year would not be
blank" (Kingdom of Priests, 1996, p. 408).
In other words, Sargon took advantage of the fact that Shalmaneser V was deposed
before his military exploits were fully recorded. Though Sargon may have accurately
recorded the results of his own invasion and deportation of Israel's northern kingdom
during his first year, he left unrecorded the much greater Israelite deportation
by his predecessor, leaving the impression that his own feats were greater than they
actually were.
Eugene Merrill's logical explanation of Sargon's extremely low figures regarding
deportees is significant because it squares Assyrian history with the biblical record.
The relatively few thousands of deportees recorded by Sargon simply do not take into
account the massive deportations already undertaken by his predecessors, Tiglath-pileser
III and Shalmaneser V.
For any who believe in the accuracy of the Scriptures the biblical record is the
most reliable historical source.
In regard to the northern kingdom's deportation, the report of 2 Kings is probably
the most essential biblical testimony: "Therefore the LORD was very angry with
Israel, and removed them from His sight; there was none left but the tribe of
Judah alone ... The LORD rejected all the descendants of Israel, afflicted
them, and delivered them into the hand of plunderers, until He had cast them from
His sight ...
"For the children of Israel walked in all the sins of Jeroboam which he did;
they did not depart from them, until the LORD removed Israel out of His sight, as
He had said by all His servants the prophets. So Israel was carried away from their
own land to Assyria, as it is to this day" (2Kings 17:18-23).
Although the Bible plainly states that the Assyrians carried the northern kingdom's
population away as captives, biblical passages and indirect archaeological evidence
indicate that some refugees from the northern tribes were living among the people
of Judah well after Israel's fall.
Probably a few northerners moved south shortly after the separation of Israel from
Judah in protest of the contemptible practices Jeroboam I (1Kings 12:25-33; 13:33;
2Chronicles 11:13-16) and his successors-most notably Ahab and Jezebel (1Kings 16:28-33; 18:3-4,18)-introduced. This first wave
of migrants into Judah would have been men and women seeking a less overtly polluted
religious environment in which to worship God.
But, just before the northern kingdom's exile, a much larger number of northerners
probably headed south to Judah to escape the Assyrian onslaughts of the eighth century
B.C. No one disputes that the population of Jerusalem expanded greatly during that
time.
Israeli archaeologist Magen Broshi estimates that the population of Jerusalem swelled
from about 7,500 to 24,000 as the eighth century drew to a close. Not all that increase
seems attributable to an expanded birthrate. Some godly northerners may even have
responded to Hezekiah's religious reformation (2Chronicles 30:1-18; 31:1), but most
probably simply acted out of fear of the coming Assyrian invasion.
Do these events indicate that God simply assimilated enough people from the northern
tribes into Judah and that the Jews who returned from the later Babylonian captivity
under Ezra and Nehemiah comprised all that God intended to preserve as His holy people
Israel? Some scholars advocate this theory, but they overlook a critical fact.
The Babylonians exiled the inhabitants of the kingdom of Judah in 587 B.C. This exile
included those who had migrated to Judah from the former northern kingdom. Seventy
years later only a small portion of those exiled to Babylon returned to rebuild the
temple and the city of Jerusalem. The Scriptures show that those who volunteered
to return and rebuild a Jewish presence in Palestine came almost exclusively from
the tribes of Judah, Benjamin and Levi (Nehemiah 11:3-36). We find no scriptural
evidence-or other historical evidence-that any significant numbers from the other
10 tribes were included in Judah's return to their homeland.
Therefore, the prophecies that refer to a future restoration of the lost 10 tribes
cannot be considered fulfilled in the return of some of the Jewish people to Jerusalem
in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah. Even those who did return comprised only a partial
restoration of the Jews. The descendants of the rest of the exiled Jewish and Israelite
families were scattered among the nations and most probably eventually lost their
identity.
Prophecy tells us that Christ will gather these, along with the lost 10 tribes, at
His return.
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