King James Version · Under Assyria
2 Chronicles 31
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Now when all this was finished, all Israel that were present went out to the cities of Judah, and brake the in pieces, and cut down the groves, and threw down the and the out of all Judah and , in also and , until they had them all. Then all the returned, every man to his possession, into their own cities. And appointed the courses of the priests and the after their courses, every man according to his , the priests and for burnt offerings and for , to minister, and to give thanks, and to of the tents of . He appointed also the king’s of his substance for the burnt offerings, to wit, for the morning and evening burnt offerings, and the burnt offerings for the , and for the new moons, and for the set feasts, as in of . Moreover he commanded the people that dwelt in to give the of the priests and the , that they might be encouraged in of . And as soon as the came abroad, the brought in abundance the of corn, , and oil, and honey, and of all the increase of the field; and the of all things brought they in abundantly. And concerning the and Judah, that dwelt in the cities of Judah, they also brought in the of oxen and sheep, and the of things which were unto their , and laid them by heaps. In the third month they began to lay the foundation of the heaps, and finished them in the seventh month. And when and the princes came and saw the heaps, they , and his people Israel. 9Then questioned with the priests and the concerning the heaps. And the of the house of Zadok answered him, and said, Since the people began to bring the into the , we have had enough to eat, and have left plenty: for hath his people; and that which is left is this great store. Then commanded to prepare chambers in the ; and they prepared them, And brought in the and the and the dedicated things faithfully: over which Cononiah the was ruler, and his brother was the next. And Jehiel, and , and , and , and , and , and , and Ismachiah, and , and , were overseers under the hand of Cononiah and his brother, at the of the king, and the ruler of the house of . And the son of the , the porter toward the east, was over the freewill of , to distribute the oblations of , and the most things. And next him were , and Miniamin, and Jeshua, and , , and , in the cities of the priests, in their set office, to give to their brethren by courses, as well to the great as to the small: Beside their genealogy of males, from three years old and upward, even unto every one that entereth into the , his daily for their in their charges according to their courses; Both to the genealogy of the priests by the house of their fathers, and the from twenty years old and upward, in their charges by their courses; And to the genealogy of all their little ones, their wives, and their sons, and their daughters, through all : for in their set office they themselves in : Also of the sons of the priests, which were in the fields of the suburbs of their cities, in every several city, the men that were expressed by name, to give portions to all the males among the priests, and to all that were by genealogies among the . And thus did throughout all Judah, and wrought that which was good and right and truth before his . And in every work that he began in the of the house of , and in , and in , to seek his , he did it with all , and prospered.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Under Assyria, 745 BC to 612 BC ›
Assyria at full stretch, deporting whole populations as policy. The northern kingdom is destroyed in 722 BC and Judah survives as a tribute-paying vassal.
- Assyria
- The first empire to run mass deportation as ordinary administration: move the leadership somewhere else, settle strangers in their place, and the province stops being a nation. It worked. Samaria fell in 722 BC and the northern tribes did not come back. Assyria also advertised its cruelty deliberately, carving flayings and impalements on palace walls where envoys would see them, because terror is cheaper than garrisons.
- Judah
- Survives by paying. Hezekiah rebels, Sennacherib takes forty-six Judean towns and besieges Jerusalem in 701 BC, and the city holds. The Assyrian account boasts of shutting Hezekiah up like a bird in a cage and pointedly does not claim to have taken the city, which is one of the more interesting silences in ancient records.
- Egypt
- The splintered reed of a staff that Assyria's field commander mocks Judah for leaning on. It promises help and cannot deliver, and Isaiah spends decades saying so. Assyria eventually invades and sacks Thebes.
- Further afield
- Greece is in its archaic period, founding colonies from Spain to the Black Sea. Rome is under kings. Assyria's own libraries are collecting the literature of Mesopotamia, which is how Gilgamesh survived to be read again in the nineteenth century.