Sennacherib at the Gates of Jerusalem: Story, History and Historiography

561 Pages·2014·4.59 MB·English

by  Isaac Kalimi

Sennacherib at the Gates of Jerusalem
Culture and History of the
Ancient Near East
Founding Editor
M.H.E. Weippert
Editor-in-Chief
Thomas Schneider
Editors
Eckart Frahm
W. Randall Garr
Baruch Halpern
Theo P.J. van den Hout
Irene J. Winter
VOLUME 71
The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/chan
Sennacherib at the Gates of Jerusalem
Story, History and Historiography
Edited by
Isaac Kalimi and Seth Richardson
LEIdEN • BOSTON
2014
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data
Sennacherib at the gates of Jerusalem : story, history and historiography / edited by Isaac
Kalimi and Seth Richardson.
  pages cm. — (Culture and history of the ancient Near East ; volume 71)
 Includes index.
 ISBN 978-90-04-26561-5 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-90-04-26562-2 (e-book)
1. Sennacherib, King of Assyria, –681 B.C. 2. Jerusalem—History—Siege, 701 B.C. I. Kalimi,
Isaac. II. Richardson, Seth.
 dS73.83.S45 2014
 933’.03—dc23
2013040379
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ISSN 1566-2055
ISBN 978-90-04-26561-5 (hardback)
ISBN 978-90-04-26562-2 (e-book)
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Dedicated to
the blessed memory of our dear friend and colleague,
Professor David Weisberg z”l,
who constantly strove for justice,
loved kindness, and
walked humbly with God and every human being.

CONTENTS
The Contributors  ............................................................................................. ix
 1. Sennacherib at the Gates of Jerusalem—Story, History
and Historiography: An Introduction  ................................................. 1
Isaac Kalimi and Seth Richardson
PART ONE
I WILL dEFENd THIS CITy TO SAVE IT
2. Sennacherib’s Campaign to Judah: The Chronicler’s View
Compared with His ‘Biblical’ Sources  ................................................. 11
Isaac Kalimi
3. Cross-examining the Assyrian Witnesses to Sennacherib’s
Third Campaign: Assessing the Limits of Historical
Reconstruction  ........................................................................................... 51
Mordechai Cogan
4. Sennacherib’s Campaign to Judah: The Archaeological
Perspective with an Emphasis on Lachish and Jerusalem  ........... 75
David Ussishkin
5. Beyond the Broken Reed: Kushite Intervention and the Limits
of l’histoire événementielle  ...................................................................... 105
Jeremy Pope
PART TWO
THE WEAPON OF AššUR
6. Family Matters: Psychohistorical Reflections on Sennacherib and
His Times  ..................................................................................................... 163
Eckart Frahm
viii contents
 7. The Road to Judah: 701 b.c.e. in the Context of Sennacherib’s
Political-Military Strategy ...................................................................... 223
Frederick Mario Fales
 8. Sennacherib’s Invasion of the Levant through the Eyes of
Assyrian Intelligence Services  .............................................................. 249
Peter Dubovský
PART THREE
AFTER LIFE
 9. Memories of Sennacherib in Aramaic Tradition  ........................... 295
Tawny L. Holm
10. Sennacherib’s Campaign and its Reception in the Time of the
Second Temple  ......................................................................................... 325
Gerbern S. Oegema
 11. Sennacherib in Midrashic and Related Literature:
Inscribing History in Midrash  .............................................................. 347
Rivka Ulmer
12. The devil in Person, the devil in disguise: Looking for
King Sennacherib in Early Christian Literature  ............................. 389
Joseph Verheyden
13. The First “World Event”: Sennacherib at Jerusalem  ..................... 433
Seth Richardson
Indices
Index of Topics  ........................................................................................... 507
Index of Key Terms  ................................................................................... 534
Index of Sources and Compositions  .................................................... 536
Index of Modern Authors  ........................................................................ 546
THE CONTRIBUTORS
Mordechai Cogan (Ph.d. University of Pennsylvania) is Professor Emeritus
of Biblical History in the department of Jewish History, The Hebrew Uni-
versity of Jerusalem. He has written widely on the relationship of Israel
and Judah with the Mesopotamian empires during the first millennium
b.c.e., and history-writing in the ancient Near East. Among his works
are: Imperialism and Religion (1974); The Raging Torrent (2008); Bound
for Exile (2013); and commentaries on 1 and 2 Kings (Anchor Bible) and
Obadiah, Jonah and Nahum (Mikra le-yisrael).
Peter Dubovský (Ph.d., Harvard University), published his dissertation
in 2006 in the series Biblica et Orientalia under the title Hezekiah and
the Assyrian Spies. Since 2008 he has been professor of Old Testament
exegesis at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome. He is the author of
twenty-nine scholarly articles and has edited commentaries on Genesis,
the Gospel of Mark, and Minor Prophets in Slovak, as well as a volume
on inspiration, Ogni Scrittura è ispirata: Nuove prospettive sull’ispirazione
biblica (2013).
Mario Fales (Ph.d., University of Rome) is Full Professor of Ancient Near
Eastern History at the University of Udine. His main scholarly interests
concern the intellectual and political history of the Neo-Assyrian empire.
He is on the editorial board of two international projects on Neo-Assyrian
texts, the State Archives of Assyria (Helsinki) and Studien zu den Assur-
Texten (Berlin), and co-directs several other journals. He is the editor of
seven edited volumes, and the author of a dozen books (most recently,
Guerre et paix en Assyrie: Religion et impérialisme [2010]) and over 150
articles. Fales has also co-directed several archaeological projects in Iraq,
Syria, Turkey, and northern Italy.
Eckart Frahm (Ph.d. Göttingen, Habilitation Heidelberg) is Professor of
Assyriology at yale University, where he has been since 2002. His main
research interests are Assyrian and Babylonian history and Mesopota-
mian scholarly texts of the first millennium b.c.e. Frahm is the author of
many articles and five books: Einleitung in die Sanherib-Inschriften (1997);
Keilschrifttexte aus Assur literarischen Inhalts, vol. 3: Historische und his-
torisch-literarische Texte (2009); Neo-Babylonian Letters and Contracts