The Medo-Persian Empire.
By Alonzo T. Jones
The passing away of the Babylonian Empire was shown to King Nebuchadnezzar in the interpretation of his vision of the great image. Daniel declared to him:— “And after thee shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee.” Dan. 2:39. We know whence this other kingdom should arise; we know what nations should come against Babylon; we know who should lead the armies; and we know how the city should be taken; for God mustered the forces, and directed the siege, and his plans were all revealed to his prophets from sixty to one hundred and seventy-five years before the city and the kingdom of Babylon fell. The way is all clear before us in this—the prophecy is plain, so also is the history. Of the nations that should overthrow the kingdom of Babylon, we read:— “Make bright the arrows; gather the shields; the Lord hath raised up the spirit of the kings of the Medes; for his device is against Babylon, to destroy it; because it is the vengeance of the Lord, the vengeance of his temple.” “Prepare against her the nations with the kings of the Medes, the captains thereof, and all the rulers thereof, and all the land of his dominion.” Jer. 51:11, 28. But the Medes were not to be alone. Isaiah cries, “Go up, O Elam; besiege, O Media.” Isa. 21:2. “And Elam bare the quiver with chariots of men and horsemen.” Isa. 22:6. Elam, the Susiana of ancient geography and history, was a province of the Babylonian Empire as late as the third year of Belshazzar (Dan. 8:1, 2); but on the rise of the Persian power, it threw off the yoke of Babylon, joined itself to Persia, became the chief province of the Persian Kingdom, and its capital, Susa (the Shushan of Scripture), became finally the capital of the whole Medo-Persian Empire. See “Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible,” “McClintock and Strong’s Encyclopedia,” “Young’s Analytical Concordance,” etc. The sequel of the revolt of Elam and of its mention in this prophecy lies in this, that Cyrus was of Elamite origin, and the recognized chief of the Susianians (Sayce, “Ancient Empires,” chap. 2, par. 46); and when he became king of Persia and began to spread his conquests, the Susianians (Elamites) only waited for the opportune moment, to revolt from Babylon and join the standard of Cyrus. But this time never came till Cyrus started to the conquest of Babylon in B. C. 539; because Cyrus and his forces, for nearly twenty years, until this time, were away to the northwest, the north, and the east, far away from the borders of Elam. (Rawlinson, Fifth Monarchy, chap. 7, par. 9, 15, 21, 25.) But when he started from Ecbatana (Fourth Mon., chap. 8, par. 47, 57, note 232), his Median capital, to the conquest of Babylon, he had to cross the province of Elam; then came the time when they could join their chosen chief; then Elam could “go up,” Media could “besiege,” and Cyrus, of Persia, could lead the forces. God had not only long beforehand named the nations that should destroy Babylon, he had also called by name the general that should lead them:— “Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, to open before him the two-leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut; I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight; I will break in pieces the gates of brass; and cut in sunder the bars of iron; and I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I, the Lord, which called thee by thy name, am the God of Israel. For Jacob my servant’s sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name; I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me.” Isa. 45:1–4. The analysis of this scripture will give us the fall of Babylon better than any other way that we could get at it. 1. “I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me.” This was written about B. C. 712. Cyrus started against Babylon in B. C. 539, and took it in 538, when he was about sixty-one years old. (“Seven Great Monarchies,” Fourth Mon., chap. 8, par. 47, 49; Fifth Mon., chap. 7, par. 25, 26.) Thus we see that the Lord called him “by name” 113 years before he was born, and told what he should do, 174 years before he did it. 2. “To open before him the two-leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut.” “I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron.” That this may be properly understood we shall have to give a brief description of the city of Babylon. And as an introduction we will give an extract from Nebuchadnezzar, and one from Herodotus. Of the building of the walls and fortresses of the city, and the length of the wall, Nebuchadnezzar himself wrote an inscription as follows: “Imgur-bel and Nivit-bel, the great walls of Babylon, I built them square. . . . I repaired, with bitumen and bricks, the sides of the ditches that had been dug. I caused to be put in order the double doors of bronze, and the railings and the gratings, in the great gateways. I enlarged the streets of Babylon so as to make them wonderful. I applied myself to the protection of Babylon and Vale Saggatu (the pyramid), and on the most elevated lands, close to the great gate of Ishtar, I constructed strong fortresses of bitumen and bricks, from the banks of the Euphrates down to the great gate, the whole extent of the streets. I established their foundations below the level of the waters. I fortified these walls with art. I caused Imgur-bel, the great wall of Babylon, the impregnable, such as no king before me had made, to be measured, 4,000 mahargagar.” “This measurement,” says Lenormant, “corresponds exactly with the 480 stades [sixty miles] given by Herodotus as the circuit.”—Ancient History of the East, book 4, chap. 5, sec. 3, par. 16. “The city stands on a broad plain,” says Herodotus, who visited it in the fifth century before the Christian era, “and is an exact square, 120 furlongs in length each way, so that the entire circuit is 480 furlongs. While such is its size, in magnificence there is no other city that approaches to it. It is surrounded, in the first place, by a broad and deep moat, full of water, behind which rises a wall 50 royal cubits in width, and 200 in height. (The royal cubit is longer by three fingers’ breadth than the common cubit.)”—Ancient History of the East, book 4, chap. 5, sec. 3, par. 7. The city, as stated above, lay in the form of a square, 15 miles on each side, making 60 miles around it. It was surrounded by a wall 350 feet high and about 85 feet thick at the top. On the top of the wall at irregular intervals were built towers to guard the most accessible parts. Of these towers there were 250. The open space on the wall, within the line of these towers, was of sufficient breadth to allow a four-horse chariot to turn with safety. Twenty-five gates pierced the wall on each side, making 100 gates in all in the outer wall. These were double gates of solid brass, with brazen lintels and posts, and fastened with bars of iron. Around the wall on the outside ran a moat, that had been formed by taking from it the earth with which the bricks were made to build the wall. Under the wall and diagonally through the city, from corner to corner so as to obtain the greatest length of water, ran the River Euphrates. On each side of the river, inside of the city, was built a strong wall, each wall being pierced with twenty-five gates opening into the streets that ran from the outer gates. These were also brazen gates like those in the outer wall. The banks of the river were lined throughout with brick laid in bitumen, with sloping landing-places at the gates. Boats were always ready at these landing-places by which to pass from side to side of the river. Over the river about the middle of the city was a drawbridge thirty feet wide supported on stone piers. At the two ends of the bridge were the two grand palaces of the city. Of course this vast area within the city was not built up solidly with houses as is a modern city. There were gardens, orchards, and fields interspersed among the houses, and about the palaces and temples. It was expected that if ever the city should be besieged, they could grow sufficient provisions within the walls to support the population, so that they might shut their gates, man the towers, and dwell securely with no fears of ever being overcome by any besieging force. Such, briefly outlined, was the Babylon against which Cyrus went to lay siege. In describing the fall of Babylon, we shall give bodily the historical view as drawn by Rawlinson from Herodotus, Xenophon, Polyhistor, Berosus, Abydenus, and the inscriptions; and as we go along insert in the record, within brackets, the prophecies that are therein fulfilled, and also the state of affairs in the city that night, as described by Daniel. This we think the best, because in this way we can present the two views almost in the form of a parallel. We would simply remark that Nabonadius was king of Babylon, and quote the history. “When at last it was rumored that the Persian king had quitted Ecbatana (B. C. 539) and commenced his march to the southwest, Nabonadius received the tidings with indifference. His defenses were completed; his city was amply provisioned; if the enemy should defeat him in the open field, he might retire behind his walls, and laugh to scorn all attempts to reduce his capital either by blockade or storm.” “If we may trust Herodotus, the invader having made all his preparations and commenced his march, came to a sudden pause midway between Ecbatana and Babylon. One of the sacred white horses, which drew the chariot of Ormazd, had been drowned in crossing a river; and Cyrus had thereupon desisted from his march, and, declaring that he would revenge himself on the insolent stream, had set his soldiers to disperse its waters into 360 channels. [Cyrus swore that he would so break the strength of the river, that, in the future, women should pass it without wetting their knees.—See Grote’s “Greece,” chap. 33, par. 3.—A. T. J.] This work employed him during the whole summer and autumn; nor was it till another spring had come that he resumed his expedition. To the Babylonians such a pause must have appeared like irresolution. They must have suspected that the invader had changed his mind and would not venture across the Tigris. If the particulars of the story reached them, they probably laughed at the monarch who vented his rage on inanimate nature, while he let his enemies go scot free.” “Cyrus, however, had a motive for his proceedings, which will appear in the sequel.” [But whatever motive Cyrus may have had in stopping here from one spring to another, there was yet a higher motive in, and over, it all. God’s people were in Babylon and they must know when its fall would be, that they might save themselves. Sixty years before He had said: “My people, go ye out of the midst of her, and deliver ye every man his soul from the fierce anger of the Lord.” And then, too, he gave them the sign by which they should know when her destruction was at hand. He said: “And lest your heart faint, and ye fear for the rumor that shall be heard in the land; a rumor shall both come one year, and after that in another year shall come a rumor, and violence in the land, ruler against ruler.” Jer. 51:45, 46533Thus when Cyrus started out, Babylon heard the “rumor” and made all ready, but Cyrus stopped and stayed all summer, through the fall, and all winter, then when spring came again, again he started, and again a “rumor” was heard in Babylon, followed swiftly by “violence” and “ruler against ruler.” And that is why he stayed there at the river so long. God was over it all. He had said that two rumors, a year apart, should reach Babylon, then his people should go out of the midst of her, and deliver “every man his soul from the fierce anger of the Lord.”] “Having wintered on the banks of the Gyndes in a mild climate, where tents would have been quite a sufficient protection for his army, he put his troops in motion at the commencement of spring, crossed the Tigris apparently unopposed, and soon came in sight of the capital. Here he found the Babylonian army drawn out to meet him under the command of Nabonadius himself, who had resolved to try the chance of battle. An engagement ensued, of which we possess no details; our informants simply tell us that the Babylonian monarch was completely defeated, and that, while most of his army sought safety within the walls of the capital, he himself with a small body of troops threw himself into Borsippa, an important town lying at a short distance from Babylon toward the southwest.” “It might have been supposed that his absence would have produced anarchy and confusion in the capital; but a step which he had recently taken with the object of giving stability to his throne, rendered the preservation of order tolerably easy. At the earliest possible moment he had associated with him in the government, his son, Belshazzar, or Bel-shar-uzur,—probably when he was about fourteen—the grandson of the great Nebuchadnezzar. [See Jer. 27:6, 7; Dan. 5:2, 11, 13, margin before noticed.] This step, taken most likely with a view to none but internal dangers, was now found exceedingly convenient for the purposes of the war. In his father’s absence Belshazzar took the direction of affairs within the city, and met and foiled for a considerable time all the assaults of the Persians. He was young and inexperienced, but he had the counsels of the queen-mother [Dan. 5:10–12] to guide and support him, as well as those of the various lords and officers of the court. So well did he manage the defense that after a while Cyrus despaired, and as a last resource ventured on a stratagem in which it was clear that he must either succeed or perish.” A. T. J. (To be concluded next week.)