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The Babylonian Empire

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International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Aug 27, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 33.

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The Babylonian Empire.

By A. T. J.

(Concluded.)
WE have seen that Nebuchadnezzar's conquests comprised all the countries westward to Asia Minor and the Mediterranean, with Egypt and Arabia. Eastward his dominion extended over all of Susiana (Elam); a part, at least, of Persia; and by the marriage of Nebuchadnezzar to the daughter of Cyaxares, and procuring a marriage between Astyages, the son of Cyaxares, and Aryenis, the daughter of the king of Lydia, Nabopolassar had succeeded in binding by blood relationship these three kingdoms—Media, Lydia, and Babylonia—into one, in which his influence, and that of Nebuchadnezzar after him was always paramount.
"By this peace the three great monarchies of the time—the Median, the Lydian, and the Babylonian—were placed on terms not only of amity, but of intimacy, and (if the word may be used) of blood relationship. The crown princes of the three kingdoms had become brothers. From the shores of the Ægean to those of the Persian Gulf, Western Asia was now ruled by inter-connected dynasties, bound by treaties to respect each others' rights, and perhaps to lend each other aid in important conjunctures, and animated, it would seem, by a real spirit of mutual friendship and mutual attachment. . . . From the date of the peace between Alyattes and Cyaxares . . . for nearly half a century, the three kingdoms of Media, Lydia, and Babylonia remained fast friends, pursuing their separate courses without quarrel or collision, and thus giving to the nations within their borders a rest and a refreshment which they must have greatly needed and desired."—Seven Great Monarchies, Third Mon., chap. 6, par. 43.
As this inter-relationship was brought about altogether, from first to last, by Nabopolassar, so, from first to last, the ascendancy of the Babylonian power was felt in the alliance. And as by the conquest of Tyre the power of Nebuchadnezzar was recognized in all the Tyrion colonies of the Mediterranean as far as to Carthage and even to Cadiz; and as by the conquest of Egypt, Arabia, Moab, Ammon, and all the Phenician countries, his power was spread from the northern borders of Syria to Ethiopia and the Arabian Desert, and as his rule extended over all of Susiana and a part of Persia; and when it is remembered that this was nearly, if not quite, six hundred years before Christ; it is evident that the Babylonian influence was recognized as far as civilization extended.
As the greatness of the kingdom was all owing to the abilities of Nebuchadnezzar, and as the empire began to decline immediately upon his death, it may properly be said that he was the empire. This will most forcibly appear in the quotations which immediately follow. It is therefore peculiarly appropriate, and expresses the very essence of all the history on the subject, when, in further explanation, Daniel exclaimed:—
"Thou art this head of gold." Dan. 2: 32, 38.
"Nebuchadnezzar is the familiar form, transcribed from the Hebrew, of the name of the great Babylonian king who carried the Jews captive, and whose reign marks the highest point of the Chaldean Empire."—Encyclopedia Britannica, art. Nebuchadnezzar.
"Nabopolassar was followed in 604 by his son Nebuchadnezzar, whose long reign of forty-three years made Babylon the mistress of the world. The whole East was overrun by the armies of Chaldea. Egypt was invaded, and the city of the Euphrates was left without a rival."—Ib., art. Babylonia, Eth. and Hist., par. 11.
"Nebuchadnezzar, Nabopolassar's eldest son, was the real founder of the Babylonian Empire. The attempt of Pharaoh Necho to win for Egypt the inheritance of Syria, was overthrown at the battle of Carchemish, and when Nebuchadnezzar succeeded his father in B. C. 604, he found himself the undisputed lord of Western Asia. . . . Babylon was now enriched with the spoils of foreign conquest. It owed as much to Nebuchadnezzar as Rome owed to Augustus. The buildings and walls with which it was adorned were worthy of the metropolis of the world."—Sayce's Ancient Empires of the East, chap. 2, par. 44, 45.
"Nebuchadnezzar rendered himself no less famous by his internal administration than by his foreign conquests. The fortune of war had placed at his disposal immense riches and innumerable captives; he employed both in the works of embellishment and of public utility, which made Babylon the most celebrated city in the world."—Ancient History of the East, book 4, chap. 5, sec. 3, par. 7.
"Crowds of captives—the produce of his various wars—Jews, Egyptians, Phenicians, Syrians, Ammonites, Moabites, were settled in various parts of Mesopotamia, more especially about Babylon. From these unfortunates forced labor was as a matter of course required; and it seems to have been chiefly, if not solely, by these exertions that the magnificent series of great works was accomplished, which formed the special glory of the Fourth Monarchy."—Seven Great Monarchies, Fourth Mon., chap. 8, par. 30.
"Throughout the empire, at Borsippa, Sippara, Cutha, Chilmad, Duraba, Teredon, and a multitude of other places, he built or rebuilt cities, repaired temples, constructed quays, reservoirs, canals, and aqueducts, on a scale of grandeur and magnificence surpassing everything of the kind recorded in history, unless it be the constructions of one or two of the greatest Egyptian monarchs." "The genius and grandeur which characterized Nebuchadnezzar, and which have handed down his name among the few ancient personages known generally throughout the East, are very apparent in Scripture, and indeed in all accounts of his reign and actions."—McClintock and Strong's Encyclopedia, art. Nebuchadnezzar, par. 6, 15.
"It is enough to note in this place that he was great both in peace and in war, but greater in the former. . . . It was as the adorner and beautifier of his native land—as the builder and restorer of almost all her cities and temples—that this monarch obtained that great reputation which has handed down his name traditionally in the East on a par with those of Nimrod, Solomon, and Alexander, and made it still a familiar term in the mouths of the people. Probably no single man ever left behind him as his memorial upon the earth one-half the amount of building that was erected by this king."—Ib., art., Babylonia History, par. 6.
"Nebuchadnezzar is the great monarch of the Babylonian Empire, which lasting only eighty-eight years—from B. C. 625 to B. C. 538—was for nearly half the time under his sway. Its military glory is due chiefly to him, while the constructive energy, which constitutes its especial characteristic, belongs to it still more markedly through his character and genius. It is scarcely too much to say that, but for Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonians would have had no place in history. At any rate, their actual place is owing almost entirely to this prince, who to the military talents of an able general added a grandeur of artistic conception and skill in construction which place him on a par with the greatest builders of antiquity."—Seven Great Monarchies, Fourth, chap. 8, par. 23.
"His last days were as brilliant as his first; his sun set in an unclouded sky, shorn of none of the rays that had given splendor to its noon-day. Nebuchadnezzar expired at Babylon in the forty-fourth year of his reign, B. C. 561, after an illness of no long duration. He was probably little short of eighty years old at his death."—Ib., par. 38.
Of the propriety of Babylon's being represented in its place in the vision, by the "gold" of the image, the following is an illustration:—
"Babylonia seems to have been the source from which Assyria drew her learning, such as it was, her architecture, the main ideas of her mimetic art, her religious notions, her legal forms, and a vast number of her customs and usages. But Babylonia herself, so far as we know, drew her stores from no foreign country. Hers was apparently the genius which excogitated an alphabet—worked out the simplest problems of arithmetic—invented implements for measuring the lapse of time—conceived the idea of raising enormous structures with the poorest of all materials, clay—discovered the art of polishing, boring, and engraving gems—reproduced with truthfulness the outlines of human and animal forms—attained to high perfection in textile fabrics—studied with success the motions of the heavenly bodies—conceived of grammar as a science—elaborated a system of law—saw the value of an exact chronology—in almost every branch of science made a beginning, thus rendering it comparatively easy for other nations to proceed with the superstructure. To Babylonia far more than to Egypt, we owe the art and learning of the Greeks. It was from the East, not from Egypt, that Greece derived her architecture, her sculpture, her science, her philosophy, her mathematical knowledge—in a word, her intellectual life. And Babylon was the source to which the entire stream of Eastern civilization may be traced."—Ib., chap. 8, last par.
"Here was the center and starting-point of the civilization which afterwards spread throughout Western Asia."—Ancient Empires, chap. 2, par. 3.
With these views of Babylon and her greatness and glory, we can see the propriety of the expressions used by Isaiah in regard to her, when he speaks of her as "Babylon the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldees' excellency," chap. 13: 19; and as "the lady of kingdoms," chap. 47: 5. But for all this the time should come when her glory was to depart; her empire should perish; and Babylon should fall to rise no more at all. This Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldees' excellency, should be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah (Isa. 13: 19); the time should come when she should be called no more "the lady of kingdoms."
In Jeremiah 27: 7 we read of the extent of the kingdom of Babylon under Nebuchadnezzar, and in whose reign it should fall, as follows:—
"And all nations shall serve him, and his son, and his son's son, until the very time of his land come; and then many nations and great kings shall serve themselves of him."
Thus we find that in the days of Nebuchadnezzar's grandson the kingdom of Babylon should pass away, and other nations and other kings should establish themselves, and serve themselves of this kingdom. And in the direct record of the fall of Babylon, given in Daniel 5, Nebuchadnezzar is repeatedly spoken of as the grandfather of Belshazzar, the king who was reigning in Babylon at the time of its fall. See verses 2, 11, 13 (margin); also "Seven Great Monarchies," Fourth Mon., chap. 8, par. 43, notes 179, 185; and par. 50.