A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W X Z

Outline of Universal History

G >> George Park Fisher >> Outline of Universal History




CHRONOLOGY.--There is much difficulty in settling the chronology in
the early centuries of the regal period of Hebrew history. Apart from
the questions which arise in comparing the biblical data, the
information derived from Egyptian and especially from Assyrian sources
has to be taken into account. Hence the dates given below must be
regarded as open to revision as our knowledge increases.

Assyriologists find that Shalmaneser II. received tribute from
_Ahab_, King of Israel, 854 B.C., and from _Jehu_, 842 B.C.;
that _Tiglath-Pileser III_ (745-727 B.C.) received tribute from
_Menahem_ in 738 B.C. and that Samaria fell in 722
B.C. Assyriology, on the basis of its data, _as at present
ascertained_, would make out a chronology something like the
following: Era of the judges, 1300-1020; Saul, 1020-1000; David,
1000-960; Solomon, 960-930; Reho-boam, 930-914 (Jeroboam I., 930-910);
Jehoshaphat, 870+-850 (Ahab, 875-853); Azanah (or Uzziah), 779-740
(Jehu, 842-815); (Jeroboam II., 783-743); (Menahem, 744-738).

DAVID AND SOLOMON.--David's reign (about 1000-970 B.C.) is the period
of Israel's greatest power. He extended his sway as far as the Red Sea
and the Euphrates; he overcame Damascus, and broke down the power of
the Philistines; he subdued the Moabites, Ammonites, and Edomites; he
conquered the Jebusites, and made Jerusalem his capital and the center
of national worship. A poet himself, he enriched the religious
service, which he organized, by lyrics--some of them composed by
himself--of unrivaled devotional depth and poetic beauty. He organized
his military force as well, and established an orderly civil
administration. His favorite son, _Absalom_, led away by
ambition, availed himself of disaffection among the people to head a
revolt against his father, but perished in the attempt. David left his
crown to _Solomon_ at the close of a checkered life, marked by
great victories, and by flagrant misdeeds done under the pressure of
temptation.

CHARACTERS OF SOLOMON'S REIGN.--Solomon's reign (about 970-933 B.C.)
was the era of luxury and splendor. He sought to emulate the other
great monarchs of the time. With the help of _Hiram_, king of
Tyre, who furnished materials and artisans, he erected a magnificent
temple on Mount Moriah in Jerusalem. He built costly palaces. He
brought horses from Egypt, and organized a standing army, with its
cavalry and chariots. He established a harem, bringing into it women
from the heathen countries, whom he allowed in their idolatrous
rites. He was even seduced to take part in them himself. Renowned for
his knowledge and for his wisdom--which was admired by the _Queen of
Saba_ (Sheba), who came to visit him from the Arabian coast--famous
as the author of wise aphorisms, he nevertheless entailed disasters on
his country. He established a sort of Oriental despotism, which
exhausted its resources, provoked discontent, and tended to undermine
morality as well as religion.

THE DIVIDED KINGDOM.--The bad effect of Solomon's magnificence soon
appeared. Before his death a revolt was made under the lead of
_Jeroboam_, which was put down. Of _Rehoboam_, the successor
of Solomon, the ten tribes north of Judah required pledges that their
burdens should be lightened. In the room of the heads and elders of
the tribes, the late king's officers had come in to oppress them with
their hard exactions. The haughty young king spurned the demand for
redress. The tribes cast off his rule, and made _Jeroboam I._
their king (about 933 B.C.). The temple was left in the hands of
_Judah_ and _Benjamin_. The division of the kingdom into
two, insured the downfall of both. The rising power of the
Mesopotamian Empire could not be met without union. On the other hand,
the concentration of worship at Jerusalem, under the auspices of the
two southern tribes, may have averted dangers that would have arisen
from the wider diffusion, and consequent exposure to corruption, of
the religious system. The development and promotion of the true
religion--the one great historical part appointed for the Hebrews--may
have been performed not less effectively, on the whole, for the
separation.

HEATHEN RITES.--From this time the energetic and prolonged contest of
the prophets with idolatry is a conspicuous feature, especially in the
history of Israel, the northern kingdom. _Jeroboam_ set up golden
calves at _Dan_ and _Bethel_, ancient seats of the worship
of Jehovah. Wars with Judah and Damascus weakened the strength of
Israel. The Egyptian king, _Shishak_, captured Jerusalem, and
bore away the treasures collected by Solomon (p. 41). Under
_Jehoshaphat_ (about 873-849 B.C.) the heathen altars were
demolished and prosperity returned.

STRUGGLE WITH IDOLATRY: ELIHAH AND ELISHA.--The contemporary of
Jehoshaphat in the northern kingdom was _Ahab_ (about 876-854
B.C.). He expended his power and wealth in the building up of
Baal-worship, at the instigation of the Tyrian princess,
_Jezebel_, whom he had married. At Samaria, his capital, he
raised a temple to Baal, where four hundred and fifty of his priests
ministered. The priests of Jehovah who withstood these measures were
driven out of the land, or into hiding-places. The austere and
intrepid prophet _Elijah_ found refuge in _Mount
Carmel_. The people, on the occasion of a famine, which he declared
to be a divine judgment, rose in their wrath, and slew the priests of
Baal. In a war--the third of a series--which Ahab waged against
_Syria_, he still fought in his chariot, after he had received a
mortal wound, until he fell dead. He had previously thrown the prophet
_Micaiah_ into prison for predicting this result. By the marriage
of _Athalia_, a daughter of Ahab and Jezebel, with Jehoshaphat's
son, Baal-worship was introduced into Jerusalem. _Joram_
succeeded Ahab. The prophet _Elisha_, who followed in the steps
of Elijah, anointed _Jehu_ "captain of the host of Joram." He
undertook, with fierce and unsparing energy, to destroy Baal-worship,
and to extirpate the house of Ahab, root and branch. The two kings of
Israel and of Judah he slew with his own hand. The priests and
servants of Baal were put to the sword. These conflicts reduced the
strength of Israel, which fell a prey to Syria, until its power was
revived by _Jeroboam II_. (783-743 B.C.). The death of
_Athalia_ brought on the expulsion of the Phoenician idolatry
from Jerusalem. The southern kingdom suffered from internal strife,
and from wars with Israel, until _Uzziah_ (779-740 B.C.)
restored its military strength, and caused agriculture and trade once
more to flourish.

THE ASSYRIAN CAPTIVITY.--The two kingdoms, in the ninth and eighth
centuries, instead of standing together against the threatening might
of Assyria, sought heathen alliances, and wasted their strength in
mutual contention. Against these hopeless alliances, and against the
idolatry and the formalism which debased the people, the prophets
contended with intense earnestness and unflinching
courage. _Amos_, called from feeding his flocks, inveighed
against frivolity and vice, misgovernment and fraud, in
Israel. _Hosea_ warned _Menahem_ (743-737 B.C.) against
invoking the help of Assyria against Damascus, but in vain. He was
terribly punished by what he suffered from the Assyrians; but Jotham
(740-736 B.C.) and Ahaz (736-728 B.C.), the Judaean kings,
successively followed his example. _Tiglath-Pileser_ made Judaea
tributary. The Assyrian rites were brought into the temple of
Jehovah. The service of Canaanitish deities was introduced. The one
incorruptible witness for the cause of Jehovah was the fearless and
eloquent prophet, _Isaiah_. Hosea, king of Israel, by his
alliance with Egypt against _Sargon_, so incensed this most
warlike of the Assyrian monarchs, that, when he had subdued the
Phoenician cities, he laid siege to Samaria; and, having captured it
at the end of a siege of three years, he led away the king and the
larger part of his subjects as captives, to the Euphrates and the
Tigris, and replaced them by subjects of his own (722 B.C.). The later
Samaritans were the descendants of this mixed population.

The Babylonian Captivity.--When _Sargon_, the object of general
dread, died, _Hezekiah_, king of Judah (727-699 B.C.), flattered
himself that it was safe to disregard the warnings of Isaiah, and, in
the hope of throwing off the Assyrian yoke, made a treaty of alliance
with the king of Egypt, and fortified Jerusalem. He abolished,
however, the heathen worship in "the high places."
_Sennacherib_, Sargon's successor, was compelled to raise the
siege (p. 46). _Manasseh_ (698-643 B.C.), in defiance of the
prophets, fostered the idolatrous and sensual worship, against which
they never ceased to lift their voices. _Josiah_ (640-609 B.C.)
was a reformer. As a tributary of Babylon, he sought to prevent
_Necho_, king of Egypt, from crossing his territory, but was
vanquished and slain at _Megiddo_, on the plain of
Esdraelon. _Nebuchadnezzar's_ victory over Necho, at
_Carchemish_, enabled the Babylonian king to tread in the
footsteps of the Assyrian conquerors. The revolt of _Zedekiah_,
which the prophet _Jeremiah_ was unable to prevent, and his
alliance with Egypt, led to the Babylonian captivity of the Jews. In
this period of national ruin, the prophetic spirit found a voice
through _Jeremiah_ and _Ezekiel_. It was during the era of
Assyrian and Babylonian invasion that the predictions of a MESSIAH, a
great Deliverer and righteous Ruler who was to come, assumed a more
definite expression. The spiritual character of _Isaiah's_
teaching has given him the name of "the evangelical prophet."

_Cyrus_, the conqueror of Babylon, opened the way (538 B.C.) for
the return of the exiles. A small part first came back under
_Zerubbabel_, head of the tribe of Judah, who was made Persian
governor. They began to rebuild the temple, which was finished in 516
B.C. Later (458 B.C.) _Ezra_ "the scribe" and _Nehemiah_ led
home a larger body. The newly returned Jews were fired with a zeal for
the observance of the Mosaic ritual,--a zeal which had been sharpened
in the persecutions and sorrows of exile. The era of the
_"hagiocracy,"_ of the supreme influence of the priesthood and
the rigid adherence to the law, with an inflexible hostility to
heathen customs, ensued. The spirit of which prophecy had been the
stimulant, and partially the fruit, declined. The political
independence of the land was gone for ever. The day of freedom under
the _Maccabees_, after the insurrection (168 B.C.) led by that
family against the Syrian successors of Alexander, was short. But
Israel "had been thrown into the stream of nations." Its religious
influence was to expand as its political strength dwindled. Its
subjugation and all its terrible misfortunes were to serve as a means
of spreading the leavening influence of its monotheistic faith.

In the year 63 B.C., _Pompeius_ made the Jews tributary to the
Romans. In the year 40 B.C., _Herod_ began to reign as a
dependent king under Rome.

_Hebrew Literature_.--The literature of the Hebrews is
essentially religious in its whole motive and spirit. This is true
even of their historical writings. The marks of the one defining
characteristic of their national life--faith in Jehovah and in his
sovereign and righteous control--are everywhere seen. Hebrew poetry is
mainly lyrical. Relics of old songs are scattered through the
historical books. In the _Psalms_, an anthology of sacred lyrics,
the spirit of Hebrew poesy attains to its highest flight. Examples of
didactic poetry are the Book of _Job_, and books like the
_Proverbs_, composed mainly of pithy sayings or gnomes. Nowhere,
save in the Psalms, does the spirit of the Hebrew religion and the
genius of the people find an expression so grand and moving as in the
_Prophets_, of whom _Isaiah_ is the chief.

ART.--In art the Hebrews did not excel. The plastic arts were
generally developed in connection with religion. But the religion of
the Hebrews excluded all visible representations of deity. Nor were
they proficients in science. "Israel was the vessel in which the water
of life was inclosed, in which it was kept cool and pure, that it
might thereafter refresh the world."

The HISTORICAL BOOKS of the Old Testament comprise, first, the
_Pentateuch_, which describes the origin of the Hebrew people,
the exodus from Egypt, and the Sinaitic legislation. Questions
pertaining to the date and authorship of these five books, and of
the materials at the basis of them, are still debated among
historical critics. It may be regarded as certain, however, that
materials belonging to nearly every period of Hebrew literature,
from the earliest times, are here combined. The early part of
Genesis is designed to explain the genealogy of the Hebrews, and to
show how, step by step, they were sundered from other peoples. The
narratives in the first ten chapters--as the story of the creation,
the flood, etc.--so strikingly resemble legends of other Semitic
nations, especially the _Babylonians_and _Phoenicians_, as
to make it plain that all these groups of accounts are historically
connected with one another. But the Genesis narratives are
distinguished by their freedom from the polytheistic ingredients
which disfigure the corresponding narratives elsewhere. They are on
the elevated plane of that pure theism which is the kernel of the
Hebrew faith. This whole subject is elucidated by Lenormant, in
_The Beginnings of History_ (1882). The Book of _Joshua_
relates the history of the conquest of Canaan; _Judges_, the
tale of the heroic age of Israel prior to the monarchy; the Books of
_Samuel_ and of _Kings_, of the monarchy in its glory and
its decline; the Books of _Chronicles_ treat of parts of the
same era, more from the point of view of the priesthood; _Ruth_
is an idyl of the narrative type; _Ezra_, _Nehemiah_, and
_Esther_ have to do with the return of the Jews from exile, and
the events next following.

The POETIC WRITINGS include the _Psalter_, by many authors; the
_Proverbs_ of Solomon and others; _Ecclesiastes_, which
gives the sombre reflections of one who had tasted to the full the
pleasures and honors of life; the _Canticles_, or _Song of
Solomon_, which depicts a young woman's love in its constancy,
and victory over temptation.

The PROPHETS are divided into four classes: i. Those of the early
period from the twelfth to the ninth century, including
_Samuel_, _Elijah_, _Eliska_, etc, who have left no
prophetical writings. 2. The prophets of the Assyrian age (800-700
B.C.), where belong _Amos, Hosea, Isaiah, Micah,_ and
_Nahum_. 3. The prophets of the Babylonian age, _Zephaniah,
Jeremiah, Habakkuk, Ezekiel_. Here some scholars would place a
part of _Isaiah_. 4. The post-exilian prophets, _Haggai,
Zachariah, Malackt, Jonah., Daniel, Joel, Obadiah_, and
considerable portions of _Isaiah_ and _Jeremiah_.

The APOCRYPHAL BOOKS belong between the closing of the Old-Testament
canon and the New Testament. They are instructive as to that
intermediate period. The _first_ Book of _Maccabees_ is
specially important for its historical matter; the Books of
_Wisdom_ and the _Son of Sirach_ for their moral
reflections and precepts.

WORKS RELATING TO HEBREW HISTORY.--EWALD, _History of the
Israelitish People_ (Eng. trans., 5 vols.); Milman, _History of
the Jews_ (3 vols.); Stade, _Geschichte des Volkes Israel_
(2 vols., 1889); Renan, _History of the People of Israel_
(Eng. trans., 1896); Wellhausen. _Israelitische und judische
Geschichte_ (3d ed., 1897); Kent, _History of the Hebrew
People_ (1898); Guthe, _Geschichte des Volkes Israel_
(1899); the Art. _Israel_ by Wellhausen, in the
_Encycl. Brit_., and the one by Guthe in the
_Encycl. Bibl._ The historical works of Jewish scholars,
Herzfeld, Jost, Zunz, Graetz, DERENBOURG, etc., are valuable.




CHAPTER V. THE PERSIANS.


In the western part of the plateau of Iran, which extends from the
Suleiman Mountains to the plains of Mesopotamia, were the
_Medes_. On the southern border of the same plateau, along the
Persian Gulf, were the _Persians_. Both were offshoots of the
Aryan family, and had migrated westward from the region of the upper
Oxus, from Bactria, the original seat of their religion.

RELIGION.--The ancient religion of the Iranians, including the Medes
and Persians, was reduced to a system by the Bactrian sage,
_Zoroaster_ (or Zarathustra), who, in the absence of authentic
knowledge respecting him, may be conjecturally placed at about 1000
B.C. The _Zendavesta_, the sacred book of the Parsees, the
adherents of this religion, is composed of parts belonging to very
different dates. It is the fragment of a more extensive literature no
longer extant. The Bactrian religion differed from that of their
Sanskrit-speaking kindred on the Indus, in being a form of dualism. It
grew out of a belief in good demons or spirits, and in evil spirits,
making up two hosts perpetually in conflict with each other. At the
head of the host of good spirits, in the Zoroastrian creed, was
_Ormuzd_, the creator, and the god of light; at the head of the
evil host, was _Ahriman_, the god of darkness. The one made the
world good, the other laid in it all that is evil. The one is disposed
to bless man, the other to do him harm. The conflict of virtue and
vice in man is a contest for control on the part of these antagonistic
powers. In order to keep off the spirits of evil, one must avoid what
is morally or ceremonially unclean. He who lived pure, went up at
death to the spirits of light. The evil soul departed to consort with
evil spirits in the region of darkness. _Mithra_, the sun-god in
the Zoroastrian system, is the equal, though the creature, of
_Ormuzd_. Mithra is the conqueror of darkness, and so the enemy
of falsehood. The Medes and Persians were fire-worshipers. To the good
spirits, they ascribed life, the fruitful earth, the refreshing
waters, fountains and rivers, the tilled ground, pastures and trees,
the lustrous metals, also truth and the pure deed. To the evil spirits
belonged darkness, disease, death, the desert, cold, filth, sin, and
falsehood. The animals were divided between the two realms. All that
live in holes, all that hurt the trees and the crops, rats and mice,
reptiles of all sorts, turtles, lizards, vermin, and noxious insects,
were hateful creatures of _Ahriman_. To kill any of these was a
merit. The dog was held sacred; as was also the cock, who announces
the break of day. In the system of worship, sacrifices were less
prominent than in India. Prayers, and the iteration of prayers, were
of great moment.

THE MAGI.--The Zoroastrian religion was not the same at all times and
in every place. The primitive Iranian emigrants were monotheistic in
their tendencies. In their western abodes, they came into contact with
worshipers of the elements,--fire, air, earth, and water. It is
thought by many scholars, that the _Magian_ system, with its more
defined dualism and sacerdotal sway, was ingrafted on the native
religion of the Iranians through the influence of tribes with whom
they mingled in Media. The Magi, according to one account, were
charged by Darius with corrupting the Zoroastrian faith and
worship. Whatever may have been their origin, they became the leaders
in worship, and privy-counselors to the sovereign. They were likewise
astrologers, and interpreters of dreams. They were not so distinct a
class as the priests in India. A hereditary order, they might still
bring new members into their ranks. From the Medes, they were
introduced among the Persians.

PERSIAN RELIGIOUS CUSTOMS.--Peculiar customs existed among the Medes
in disposing of the dead. They were not to be cast into the fire or
the water, or buried in the earth, for this would bring pollution to
what was sacred; but their bodies were to be exposed in the high
rocks, where the beasts and birds could devour them. Sacrifices were
offered on hill-tops. Salutations of homage were made to the rising
sun. On some occasions, boys were buried alive, as an offering to the
divinities. In early times, there were no images of the gods. As far
as they were introduced in later times, it was through the influence
of surrounding nations. In the supremacy and the final victory, which,
in the later form of Zoroastrianism, were accorded to _Ormuzd_,
there was again an approach to monotheism. Hostility to deception of
all sorts, and thus to stealing, was a Persian trait. _Herodotus_
says that the Persians taught their children to ride, to shoot the
bow, and to speak the truth. To prize the pursuits of agriculture and
horticulture, was a part of their religion. They allowed a plurality
of wives, and concubines with them; but there was one wife to whom
precedence belonged. Voluntary celibacy in man or woman was counted a
flagrant sin.

HISTORY.--The first authentic notice that we have of the MEDES shows
them under Assyrian power. This is in the time of _Shalmaneser
II._, 840 B.C. Their rise is coincident with the fall of
Assyria. _Phraortes_ (647-625 B.C.) began the Median struggle for
independence; although the name of _Deioces_ is given by
_Herodotus_ as a previous king, and the builder of
_Ecbatana_ the capital. It was reserved for _Cyaxares_
(625-585 B.C.), having delivered his land from the Scythian marauders
(p. 47), to complete, in conjunction with the Babylonian king,
_Nabopolassar_, the work of breaking down the Assyrian empire
(p. 48). He brought under his rule the _Bactrians_, and the
_Persians_ about _Pasargadæ_ and _Persepolis_, and made
the _Halys_, dividing Asia Minor, the limit of his kingdom. His
effeminate son, _Astyages_, lost what his father had won. The
Persian branch of the Iranians gained the supremacy. _Cyrus_, the
leader of the Persian revolt, by whom _Astyages_ was defeated, is
described as related to him; but this story, as well as the account of
his being rescued from death and brought up among shepherds, is
probably a fiction.

CYRUS.--In the sixth century B.C., this famous ruler and conqueror
became the founder of an empire which comprised nearly all the
civilized nations of Asia. During his reign of thirty years (559-530
B.C.), he annexed to his kingdom the two principal states, LYDIA and
BABYLON. The king of Lydia was _Croesus_, whose story,
embellished with romantic details, was long familiar as a signal
example of the mutations of fortune. Doomed to be burned after the
capture of _Sardis_, his capital, he was heard, just when the
fire was to be kindled, to say something about _Solon_. In answer
to the inquiry of Cyrus, whose curiosity was excited, he related how
that Grecian sage, after beholding his treasures, had refused to call
him the most fortunate of men, on the ground that "no man can be
called happy before his death," because none can tell what disasters
may befall him. Cyrus, according to the narrative, touched by the
tale, delivered Croesus from death, and thereafter bestowed on him
honor and confidence.

There is another form of the tradition, which is deemed by some more
probable. Croesus is said to have stood on a pyre, intending to
offer himself in the flames, to propitiate the god _Sandon_,
that his people might be saved from destruction; but he was
prevented, it is said, by unfavorable auguries.

The subjection of the Greek colonies on the Asia-Minor coast followed
upon the subjugation of Lydia. From these colonies, the
_Phocoeans_ went forth, and founded _Elea_ in Lower Italy,
and Massilia (Marseilles) in Gaul. The Asian Greek cities were each
allowed its own municipal rulers, but paid tribute to the Persian
master. The conquest of _Babylon_ (538 B.C.), as it opened the
way for the return to Jerusalem of the Jewish exiles, enabled Cyrus to
establish a friendly people in Judaea, as a help in fortifying his
sway in Syria, and in opening a path to _Egypt_. But in 529 he
lost his life in a war which he was waging against the
_Massagetae_, a tribe on the Caspian, allied in blood to the
Scythians.

There was a tradition that the barbarian queen, _Tomyris_,
enraged that Cyrus had overcome her son by deceit, dipped the slain
king's head in a skin-bag of blood, exclaiming, "Drink thy fill of
blood, of which thou couldst not have enough in thy lifetime!"

CAMBYSES.--The successor of Cyrus, a man not less warlike than he, but
more violent in his passions, reigned but seven years (529-522
B.C.). His most conspicuous achievement was the conquest of EGYPT. One
ground or pretext of his hostility, according to the tale of
Herodotus, was the fact that Amasis, the predecessor of _Psammeticus
III._, not daring to refuse the demand of his daughter as a wife,
to be second in rank to the Persian queen, had fraudulently sent,
either to Cambyses, or, before his time, to Cyrus, _Nitetis_, the
daughter of the king who preceded him, Apries. Defeated at
_Pelusium_, and compelled to yield up _Memphis_ after a
siege, it is said that Psammeticus, the _Psammenitus_ of
Herodotus, the unfortunate successor of the powerful Pharaohs, was
obliged to look on the spectacle of his daughters in the garb of
working-women, bearing water, and to see his sons, with the principal
young nobles, ordered to execution. But this tale lacks
confirmation. His cruelties were probably of a later date, and were
provoked by the chagrin he felt, and the satisfaction manifested by
the people, at the failure of great expeditions which he sent
southward for the conquest of _Meroe_, and westward against the
_Oasis of Ammon_. His armies perished in the Lybian deserts. Even
the story of his stabbing the sacred steer (_Apis_), after these
events, although it may be true, is not sanctioned by the Egyptian
inscriptions. His attack upon Ammon probably arose, in part at least,
from a desire to possess himself of whatever lay between Egypt and the
Carthaginian territory. But the Phoenician sailors who manned his
fleet refused to sail against their brethren in
Carthage. _Cambyses_ assumed the title and character of an
Egyptian sovereign. The story of his madness is an invention of the
Egyptian priests.

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