Prophet Against Terror – Isaiah’s Tale of Three Cities

Jerusalem's citizens realized the Assyrians had them surrounded.

Isaiah the Biblical prophet lived and worked from about 740 to 686 BC. In his day Jerusalem, Samaria and Nineveh were three strong cities. Today, Nineveh and Samaria are museum pieces while Jerusalem survives as a center of conflict and hope. Isaiah was called to bring a godly perspective to the brutal power politics of his time. Just like today’s potentates and rulers many were seemingly oblivious to the Great God’s standards of international conduct. Yet God’s word through Isaiah came to pass. Read of Isaiah’s lesson for us today.

By Neil Earle

Jerusalem, Samaria, and Nineveh. Three ancient capitals involved in a dynamic conjunction of international politics and Bible prophecy. Each city was given a chance to live their lives in surrender to the will of their Creator.

Jerusalem was David’s City, the capital of ancient Judah. Samaria was the capital of Israel, to the north. Nineveh was the chief urban center of aggressive Assyria, in what is today Northern Iraq. It was sometime around 745 B.C., as the Assyrian Empire began to dominate the smaller nations of the Middle East, that Isaiah was called to the prophetic office (Isaiah 6:1-3).

Hezekiah’s Legacy in Stone

Map of Hezekiah's tunnel. Click to enlarge.
With the Assyrians on the march King Hezekiah had fortified 46 cities – all of which fell to the Assyrian army (2 Kings 18:13). Hemmed up in Jerusalem it became necessary to secure the city’s water supply – the Gihon Spring just outside the city walls. To prepare for the siege Hezekiah built a pool inside the city connected to the water supply by a long tunnel (2 Kings 20:20).

Boy in Hezekiah's tunnel. Click to enlarge.
“Hezekiah’s Tunnel” is still there – 1749 feet long and in places 100 feet beneath the streets of the city. It was discovered in 1880 and many of our readers have walked through it as a “must do” tourist event in Jerusalem.

Carved into the walls of the tunnel about 20 feet from the ending at the Siloam Pool (mentioned in John 9:7 there is an inscription: “While the stonecutters were still wielding the axe, each man towards his fellow…they heard the sound of each calling to his fellow…And on the days of the breakthrough, the stonecutters struck each man towards his fellows, axe against axe, and the water flowed form the source to the pool for 1200 cubits” (Shanks, Ancient Israel: From Abraham to the Roman Destruction of the Temple, page 182).

Some 1200 stamps found on jar handles in and around Jerusalem have been found with the inscription “lmk” meaning “belonging to the king.” The king’s own personal seal with a scarab for decoration has also come to light reading “Belonging to Hezekiah, son of Ahaz, king of Judah.”

Hezekiah was a busy man but it is his faith in trusting God against Assyria which inspires us today.

The Assyrian Thunderbolt

Isaiah’s appointment came in the nick of time. The rulers of Nineveh were beginning a renewed period of expansion. Assyria “reached the height of its power only after 700 B.C. By that time the Assyrians held most of Mesopotamia, Syria, the Palestine coast, and Egypt. They enforced their rule by a deliberate policy of calculated terror and enslavement, torturing and killing thousands of captives” (Strayer, Gatze, and Harbison, The Course of Civilization: Volume One, p. 30).

Isaiah’s call to prophesy was the overture to this tale of three cities. While the smaller nations and rulers wheeled and dealed to seek the favour of Assyria Isaiah reminded them of the Great God before whom they were all just a drop in a bucket (Isaiah 40:15). He proclaimed national repentance to all three cities &Ndash; “in repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength” (Isaiah 30:15). Even Isaiah’s name (“Yawheh is salvation”) meant something.

Yahweh was the God of Judah. But also of Israel whose ten tribes and their capital city Samaria had split off from Jerusalem some years earlier (I Kings 12). But God still had his eye on them even as they rejected him (Isaiah 28). Isaiah had a word for fierce Assyria too in their seemingly impregnable capital of Nineveh (Isaiah 10:5). A prophet named Jonah had been sent to them some years before and the Assyrians had listened (Jonah 1:1).

So, from Jerusalem Isaiah spoke of the God of Israel who ruled in the affairs of men. This generous being stood ready to forgive (Isaiah 1:16-20). He would surely intervene for any people if they would turn to him in real repentance and faith (Isaiah 2:5).

Isaiah is famous for shining visions of future hope that would far transcend his own day, visions of a Messiah who would appear to lead his people to lasting rest and security (Isaiah 11:1-5). But he was no impractical mystic offering platitudes while the world about him fell apart. His offer of national repentance was meant to deliver small powers and superpowers alike. In describing the greatness of Israel’s God, Isaiah left behind a riveting and dynamic book chock full of the glory of God (Isaiah 40.

King Hezekiah's personal seal – the scarab – what a great archaeological testimony.

“The Assyrians are Coming”

Isaiah’s ministry coincided with “the most momentous event [of] almost any period of Israelite history” (Lasor, Hubbard and Bush, Old Testament History, p. 279).By 740 the Assyrian Tiglath-pileser had expanded into northern Syria. Israel’s king was forced to pay tribute (2 Kings 15:19). Soon, relentless Assyrian columns would slice across the upper Jordan region, seize northern Israel (Isaiah 9:1), and carry off many into captivity.

“The Assyrians are coming!” This alarm congealed the hearts of people in the Ancient Near East. Nations trembled (Isaiah 5:26-28). No wonder for Nineveh’s warlords employed calculated terror! One Assyrian leader boasted: “I stormed the mountain peaks and took them….The heads of their warriors I cut off, and I formed them into a pillar over against their city…I flayed all the chief men who had revolted” (Finegan, Light From the Ancient Past, p. 202-3).

This was the terrorist army that threatened Samaria and Jerusalem. But Isaiah the Prophet was as relentless as the armies of Nineveh. He preached deliverance and hope to his nervous young king, Hezekiah (Isaiah 37:5-7). He knew that cruel Assyria was no match for the God of the Universe (Isaiah 40:28-31).

In a daring prediction, the Judaean seer even forecast the end of Assyria while that empire was at its peak: ”When the Lord has finished all his work against Mount Zion and Jerusalem, he will say, ‘I will punish the king of Assyria for the willful pride of his heart and the haughty look of his eyes’” (Isaiah 10:12).

The Taylor Prism in the British Museum, on which Hezekiah is mentioned. Remarkably, Assyrian King Sennacherib did not claim to capture Jerusalem. Click to enlarge.

The Spreading Shadow

But before the humbling of Nineveh, Isaiah’s God had a bone to pick with the corrupt, idolatrous Israelites in their capital of Samaria. God had singled out Israel to be an example of his way of fairness and equity. They, however, chose the slippery game of commercialism with little regard for basic decency and compassion (Amos 2:6-8). Isaiah’s predecessors had noted how the Samarians had trampled on basic principles of social justice (Amos 6:1-7).

Inspired, Isaiah sang a “protest song” – his Ode to a Vineyard in chapter 5 got to the heart of the matter: “When I looked for good grapes, why did it yield only bad (verse 4)?” The vineyard was a symbol for Samaria but God was also calling Judah and Jerusalem to repent as well as idolatrous Israel “The vineyard of the Lord Almighty is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are the garden of his delight. And he looked for justice, but saw bloodshed; for righteousness but heard cries of distress” (Isaiah 5:7).

The Doom of Samaria

“Now I will tell you what I am going to do to my vineyard,” God said. “I will take away its hedge, and it will be destroyed; I will break down its wall, and it will be trampled” (Isaiah 5:5).

That happened.

Samaria refused to heed the message, even when Jerusalem’s good King Hezekiah invited them to participate in ceremonies of national repentance. “People of Israel return to the Lord,” was the message (2 Kings 30:6). Samaria scorned it (verse 10).

Judgment fell. Assyrian King Shalmaneser V (727-722) and then Sargon II (722-705) swept into Israel on their way to trounce the Egyptians. Samaria was destroyed and leveled, her people uprooted (2 Kings 17). “Israel’s proud kingdom had fallen, no more to rise” (Old Testament Survey, p. 211).

By the dreadful arithmetic of international politics it was one city down; one more to go.

Restored Assyria monument is still there in Nineveh Province, Mosul, Iraq.

Nineveh’s Turn

Nineveh, Samaria’s nemesis way off in Mesopotamia, was described as “queen city of the earth, mighty and brutal beyond imagination, head of a warrior state built on the loot of nations. Limitless wealth from the ends of the earth poured into its coffers. “ Nahum likens it to a den of ravaging lions, feeding on the blood of nations” (Halley’s Bible Handbook, 24th Edition, p. 369).

Isaiah’s God decreed doom for Assyria and its capital, Nineveh: “Woe to the Assyrian, the rod of my anger, in whose hand is the club of my wrath! …The Lord, the Lord Almighty, will send wasting disease upon his sturdy warriors; under his pomp a fire will be kindled like a blazing flame” (Isaiah 10:5, 16).

That happened. Avenging armies from Babylon and Media finally closed the ring on proud Nineveh. In 612 B.C. the city was burnt, as Isaiah had foretold. The Assyrians had refused to repent. They had not learned the lesson that instruments of judgement can themselves be judged, that God rules in the affairs of men and that he expects justice and fair play from those he has given worldly authority. Those are lessons not just for Isaiah’s time but for all time (Isaiah 46:8-10).

Jerusalem Spared

Two cities down. One to go?

No. Not quite.

In Isaiah’s day, the Assyrians under Sennacherib had reached the very walls of Jerusalem (2 Kings 18, 19). Jerusalem stood encircled like a Judahite Alamo (Isaiah 1:7-9). But Judah’s king, the righteous Hezekiah (716-687), had learned from Samaria's fall. He respected the God of Israel (2 Chronicles 30: 13-18). He prayed a prayer of repentance for him and his people: “It is true, O Lord, that the Assyrian kings have laid waste these nations and their lands…Now, O lord our God deliver us from his hand, so that all kingdoms on earth may know that you alone, O Lord, are God” (2 Kings 19:17-19).

There is the steady lesson of all the prophets—God rules in the affairs of men.

Reassured by Isaiah (Isaiah 37:21-29), Hezekiah refused to be cowed by the taunts of Sennacherib’s army. He turned to God in repentance and faith.

The results were momentous. Both biblical history (Isaiah 19:35-36) and secular archaeology hint at a setback during Sennacherib’s last campaign. The Taylor Prism in the British Museum records Sennacherib’s boast of shutting up Hezekiah in Jerusalem “like a bird in a cage.” But…it contains no record of the fall of Jerusalem. To many scholars this is evidence that Sennacherib faced an embarrassing setback outside Jerusalem (Finegan, p. 213).

“Assyria, my People”

The defeat of the Assyrians after the repentance of King Hezekiah and his people saved the city of Jerusalem. It illustrated Isaiah’s theme wonderfully. “In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength” (Isaiah 30:15).

Yes, Isaiah’ s tale of three cities is more than a quaint historical survey. Isaiah’s predictions pointed beyond his time. As the Assyrian darkness encircled Judah, the prophet offered a more far-reaching hope. Out of the conquered province of Galilee there would one day come a great light (Isaiah 9:1-2). From the royal line of King David, represented by righteous King Hezekiah, would come an even mightier Deliverer (Isaiah 11:1-10).

Christians believe these prophecies were fulfilled in the ministry of Jesus of Nazareth, the prophet from Galilee. Jesus was born of a virgin as Isaiah had intimated and set forth as the ultimate Deliverer of his people (Isaiah 7:13-17; Matthew 23:37). Also, as Isaiah had foreseen, the people of Assyria were among the first of the nations to accept the Christian message (Isaiah 19:25).

Jesus, like Isaiah, also warned of judgment for people and nations who will not turn from their wantonly cruel ways. “Unless you repent,“ Jesus preached, “you too will all perish” (Luke 13:5). Big nations and small nations. Superpowers and individuals. Judgment then and judgment now. God does not change. This makes Isaiah’s tale of three cities a powerful message for today’s cruel fomentors of hate and brutality. God is still on his throne and the God of Isaiah, the God who sent Jesus, stands ready to bless nations and peoples if they change but to unleash judgment if they refuse.

Which will we chose?