Uzziah (Ozias) (in the Year of the World 4388), son of Amaziah (Amasia) and twelfth king of Judah, was a very gentle and worthy man, who did good before the Lord; except that he usurped the office of priest, in this, that he himself, although Azariah was the priest, presumed to make a burnt offering on the altar of incense. Therefore he was smitten with leprosy.[] And an earthquake occurred, in consequence of which half a mountain was torn asunder and the royal garden was sunk.[Amos 1:1; Zech. 14:5.] Yet Uzziah defeated the enemies all about him and beautified Jerusalem; and he rebuilt the walls that Joash (Joas) destroyed. Because of his leprosy he was removed from the city, and Jotham (Joatham) reigned in his stead. Upon his death Uzziah was buried in the sepulcher of the kings of Jerusalem.
Sardanapalus (Sardanapallus) was a depraved, unchaste, and effeminate man. He first introduced the use of the cushion or pillow. He associated with brazen women; and for these reasons loss and death followed him and divided his realm as previously related.[See Folio LIV recto, and note on Sardanapalus.] Terrible times came and these continued almost to the birth of Christ, during which period human blood was spilled like water throughout the world.
Pul (Phull),[Pul was king of Assyria about 765 BCE, when Assyria is first mentioned in the Bible after the time of Nimrod. He invaded Israel but was induced to retire by a present of 1000 talents of silver. (II Kings 15:19, 20; I Chron. 5:26)] the king of the Assyrians, and his successor endeavored to restore the monarchy; and in consequence they distressed the country in no small degree.
Jotham (Joathan) in the Year of the World 4440.[This sentence does not appear in the German edition of the .]
Tiglath-pileser (Thleglathpalazar) captured the countries of Naphtali (Neptalim) and Galilee (Gallilea) and the lands beyond the Jordan, incorporating these into Assyria. Later, at the behest of Ahaz (Achas) he besieged Damascus and slew Rezin (Raasim), the king of Damascus.[Tiglath-pileser II was king of Assyria in the time of king Ahaz (747-729 BCE), Tiglath-pileser I having begun to reign about 1130 BCE, but not being mentioned in the Bible. The latter king, early in his reign, about 741 BCE, made a campaign against Pekah, king of Israel, overran all the northern part of the kingdom, carried away captive many inhabitants of the cities and placed them in various parts of his own kingdom (II Kings 15:29). Some years later the allied kings of Israel and Syria, Pekah and Rezin, having made war against Judah, Ahaz foolishly applied to Tiglath-pileser for assistance. The Assyrian army captured Damascus and slew Rezin (II Kings 16:9). It then ravaged Israel, chiefly east of the Jordan, carried off many captives, and exacted a very heavy tribute from Ahaz and greatly distressed him (I Chron. 5:26; II Chron. 28:16-21). Tiglath-pileser II reigned about nineteen years, and was succeeded by his son Shalmaneser IV.]
Shalmaneser (Salmanasar) besieged Samaria and added Israel to Assyria. The kingdom of Israel ended after enduring for 282 years.[Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, reigned from 727 to 722 BCE, coming between the reigns of Tiglath-pileser and Sargon. He invaded Israel. Hoshea the king had revolted, but he conquered him and exacted a tribute. (II Kings 17:3) He then returned home, but as Hoshea revolted a second time and allied himself with the king of Egypt, Shalmaneser returned; and he ravaged Samaria, besieged Hoshea in his capital; and after three years the city fell. However, during his period a rebellion headed by Sargon broke out in Assyria, and Shalmaneser was deposed. ]
Ahaz (Achas) (in the Year of the World 4466)[ The phrase in the parenthesis does not occur in the German edition of the .] reigned in Judah after the death of his father Jotham (Joathan). He was the most evil, and zealously addicted to idolatry. Pekah (Phacee) came against him, and in a single day slew in battle 120,000 fighting men of Judah, and carried off 20,000 children, maidens and women as captives. But these he sent home again on the advice of the prophets.[Ahaz, son of Jotham, was the 11th king of Judah. He ascended the throne in his twenties, and reigned 16 years. He was a polytheist and held God in contempt. He made his own children pass through the fire to idols. He introduced the Syrian gods into Jerusalem, altered the temple after the Syrian model, and even closed it altogether. He met various repulses at the hands of Pekah and Rezin. The Edomites revolted and the Philistines harassed him. He sought the aid of Pul, king of Assyria, and in consequence became tributary to him and to his successor Tiglath-pileser. Ahaz was reduced to great extremities in buying off the Assyrians; and yet he became still more infatuated with polytheism. He died in at 36, and was refused burial with the ancestral kings. (II Chron. 28)] At this time Rome was built.[This paragraph and the one that follows it (on Hezekiah) are switched in the German edition of the .]
Hezekiah (Ezechias) (in the Year of the World 4472)[The phrase in the parenthesis does not occur in the German edition of the .], son of Ahaz (Achab) and 15th king of Judah, was the best and most pious, and he led the people back to the service of God. During his time the kingdom of the ten tribes declined and though Shalmaneser, the king, became part of Assyria. Sennacherib, king of Assyria, overran Hezekiah and his kingdom and besieged Jerusalem; but in answer to prayer and penance on the part of Hezekiah and Isaiah (Ysaye), the angel of the Lord in one night slew 285,000 men of the hosts of Sennacherib; and thus was Hezekiah relieved. Now, because of his boastful pride, or by reason of his ingratitude, Hezekiah was taken deathly ill; but through remorse and atonement he was restored to health. And as a sign of the cure the course of the sun was reversed by ten degrees. To the messengers of the king of Babylon he displayed all his riches; whereupon Isaiah prophesied to him that these same riches would be carried off by the Babylonians.
Hezekiah was a distinguished king of Judah, the son and successor of the apostate Ahaz. He ascended the throne at the age of 25 and ruled 29 years, till 697 BCE. During his reign the temple was repaired, and the Passover celebrated. A proclamation was sent from Dan to Beersheba inviting the tribes to Jerusalem to keep the Passover, and as a result of the convocation a national religious zeal broke out. Hezekiah held Isaiah in high esteem and frequently consulted him. He warred against the Philistines, and regained what his father had lost. He rebelled against the domination of Assyria. Sennacherib invaded his kingdom with an immense army, but was miraculously defeated. In the events of his private life, one is to be noted of peculiar significance.
The king became sick to death, and Isaiah uttered his doom, telling him that he must die (II Kings 20:1-11):
Thus as a sign of the cure the dial was made to go back ten degrees. Another event of note in Hezekiah's life was the punishment pronounced upon his house by Isaiah for the display he made of his riches to the messengers of the king of Babylon, who had come to congratulate him upon his recovery (II Kings 20:15). Hezekiah died in honor and was buried in the "highest of the sepulchers of the sons of David."
Sennacherib (as already stated) disgracefully fled; and he came to Nineveh and tortured the Jews and Tobias. He was finally slain by his own sons.[Sennacherib was the son and successor of Sargon. Judah had paid tribute to Assyria, but under Hezekiah it revolted; and so Sennacherib determined to take revenge on Judah. And so he invaded Palestine on two occasions, on the first of which he was pacified by a tribute. When Hezekiah revolted a second time, Sennacherib sent an embassy demanding submission. In response to which Hezekiah prayed to God for deliverance. In consequence, the Bible claims, 185,000 Assyrians died of the plague in a night, the siege was raised and Sennacherib returned to Nineveh (II Kings 19:35). He had reigned twenty-two years, and brilliantly. He crushed the revolt of Babylon, attacked Sidon, made many cities tributary, and as Sargon had done, laid a heavy hand on the neighboring nations. His palaces were large and beautiful, and his monuments exist in unexpected places.]
Manasseh (Manasses) (in the Year of the World 4501)[The phrase in the parenthesis does not occur in the German edition of the .], son of Hezekiah, reigned after him in Judah for 55 years. He was a very evil man and inclined to idolatry and superstition. He slew the prophets, and Isaiah in particular he ordered to be cut apart with a wood saw. He was taken captive to Babylon, but upon his repentance and humility he received pardon and mercy, and was restored to his kingdom. After him reigned Amon, his son, who followed in the footsteps of his father in matters of sin, but not in repentance. He was slain by his relatives.[Manasseh, successor of Hezekiah, as king of Judah, ascended the throne at the age of twelve. The early parts of his reign were distinguished by acts of impiety and cruelty, and he succeeded in drawing his subjects away from the Lord to such an extent that the only kind of worship not allowed in Judah was that of Jehovah (II Kings 21:2-9). In the end he did much to repair the evils of his former life. (II Chron. 33:1-20)]
The Lineage of Christ is here continued from Folio LIII recto, where it ended with Amaziah (Amasias). It is here resumed as follows:
The Assyrian Lineage is here continued from Folio XLII verson (which there ended with Thineus) and is here resumed as follows:
Zephaniah (Sophonias), the ninth of the twelve prophets, was a son of Cushi (Chus), noblest of men. To the Hebrews he prophesied the destruction and rebuilding of Jerusalem.[Zephaniah, ninth of the minor prophets, was the son of Cushi, and lived in the days of Josiah. His prophecy was uttered in the early part of the ministry of Jeremiah and was mainly designed to excite the Jewish nation to repentance, in view of threatened judgments, and to comfort the people of God with promises of the final triumph of righteousness. The description of the judgment in 1:14, 15, "The great day of Jehovah is near" (in the Latin version, Dies irae dies illa) has furnished the key note to the sublimest hymn of the Middle Ages, the Dies irae, traditionally attributed to Thomas of Celano (c. 1250).]
Uriah (Urias), the prophet, was slain by king Jehoiakim (Jeconia).[Uriah or Urias, son of Shemaiah, a faithful prophet in Judah in the time of Jehoiakim, confirmed the prediction of Jeremiah against Judah; and having fled to Egypt for refuge from the enraged king, and having been sent back by Pharaoh-necho on demand, he was wickedly slain and dishonorably buried (Jer. 26:20-23).]
Habakkuk (Abacuck), tenth among the prophets, full of the spirit of prophecy, and held in esteem in Judah, prophesied against Nebuchadnezzar (Nabuchodonosor) and Babylonia. He also brought food to Daniel while in the lion's den in Babylonia.[Habakkuk, or Habbakkuk (Abacuck) was one of the twelve minor prophets of whose birth we know neither time nor place. He lived in the reign of Jehoiakim, or of Josiah. The prophecy of Habakkuk relates chiefly to the invasion of Judaea by the Chaldaeans, and the subsequent punishment of the Chaldaens themselves, ch. 2. The passage, 2:4, "the just shall live by his faith, " furnished Paul the text for his Epistle to the Romans (Rom. 1:17). The Book of Habakkuk consists of three chapters, which all constitute one oracle. The first foretells the woes which the Chaldaeans would soon inflict on his nation; the second, the future humiliation of the iniquitous conquerors; in the third the prophet implores the aid of Jehovah in view of his mighty works of ancient days, and expresses the most assured trust in him. ]
Baruch was the scribe of Jeremiah the prophet. He made a prophetic book, and in it predicted the return from captivity.[Baruch was the secretary of the prophet Jeremiah, and came of a distinguished Jewish family (Jer. 32:12). His friendship for Jeremiah was strong and constant. At his dictation Baruch wrote the prophecies. These he read before the princes, who rehearsed them to Jehoiakim the king, having previously deposited the writing in one of the offices of the temple. The king ordered the writing to be read in his presence, and he became so exasperated that he destroyed the manuscripts and gave orders to arrest both the prophet and his secretary, but they had concealed themselves. Jehovah, however, repeated the prophecies to Jeremiah with some additions, and Baruch wrote them down a second time. Baruch was falsely accused of influencing Jeremiah in favor of the Chaldaeans, and they were both imprisoned until the capture of Jerusalem in 586 BCE. They were afterward forced to go down to Egypt (Jer. 43:6-7). The Book of Baruch is one of the Apochrypha of the Old Testament, of uncertain date and authorship.]
Jeremiah, the holiest of the prophets, sanctified from his mother's womb (of a race) of priests, began to prophesy against Jerusalem and the temple, when he was still a child and but twelve years of age. And he prophesied for forty years, not including the years during which he prophesied in Egypt. And there, after many daring predictions, he was stoned by the people at Tahpanhes and buried in the same region; and after he drove out the snakes, he was honored.
Jeremiah was one of the four major prophets, the other three being Isaiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel. He was the son of Hilkiah, of Anathoth, in the land of Benjamin, (Jer.1:1) and lived under various kings from Josiah to the Captivity. As Professor Plumptre observes, "there is no one in the ‘goodly fellowship of the prophets' of whom, in his work, feelings and sufferings, we have so distinct a knowledge, although it is derived almost exclusively from his book. He is the great example of the prophetic life. It is not to be wondered at that he should have seemed to the Christian feeling of the early church a type of Him in whom that life received its highest completion." He was not only the prophet of sorrow and public calamity, but also of a new and better covenant of the heart. Jeremiah was very young when called to his prophetic office, and for 42 years he persisted in this arduous service with diligence and fidelity, in the midst of the severest trials and persecutions. It was probably owing to his youth at the time, and his residence in Anathoth, that when the book of the Law was found in the house of the Lord , the king sent to Huldah the prophetess, instead of to him, to inquire of the Lord (II Kings 22:14). During all this time Jerusalem was in a distracted and deplorable state and the prophet was calumniated, imprisoned, and often in danger of death. But nothing could deter him. His exhortations to the king and rulers were to submit at once to the arms of Nebuchadnezzar, for by that means they would preserve their lives, while continued resistance would bring certain and dreadful destruction on Jerusalem. At this time the city swarmed with false prophets who contradicted Jeremiah and flattered the king and his courtiers that God would rescue them from the impending danger; and after the city was taken and part of the population carried to Babylon, these prophets confidently predicted a speedy return. On the other hand Jeremiah predicted that their captivity would be a long one and would endure for seventy years.
The prophecy of Jeremiah is a reflection of his sad and tender character and the calamities of his age. It embraces a period of 40 years. Jeremiah entered upon the office of prophet in the thirtieth year of Josiah, and his prophecy relates to the judgments that were to come in consequence of the gross idolatry and corruption of the people. His end is uncertain. There are indications that he may have reached extreme old age. On the other hand there is the tradition that the long tragedy of his life ended in actual martyrdom, and that the Jews at Tahpanhes, irritated by his rebukes, finally stoned him to death. Most commentators on the New Testament find an allusion to this in Hebrews 11:37.
This paragraph and the one that follows it (on Saraiah) are switched in the German edition of the Chronicle.
Seraiah (Sarayas) was slain by Nebuchadnezzar at Riblah with other advisers of Zedekiah.[Saraiah is the high priest who in the reign of Zedekiah was taken captive by Nebuchadnezzar and killed at Riblah (II Kings 25:18-21; I Chr. 6:14; Jer. 52:24-27).]
Huldah (Olda), the prophetess, was the wife of Shallum (Sellum) the high priest. She was illustrious and prophesied for Josiah (Josia), and particularly concerning the destruction of Jerusalem and the captivity of its people.[Huldah (Olda), a prophetess, wife of Shallum, keeper of the wardrobe under Josiah, and who dwelt in the suburbs, was the most noted person of prophetic gift in Jerusalem while Jeremiah was still at Anathoth. Josiah had recourse to her when Hellish found the Book of the Law, to procure an authoritative opinion on it (II Kings 22:14; II Chron. 34:22).]
These six (referring to portraits of Mizahel, Hananiah (Ananias), Azariah (Azaias) Daniel (the text incorrectly reads David), Ezekiel (Ezechiel), and Merodach (Mardocheus) below the text) all yet children, were, together with Joachim, the king, carried to Babylonia in captivity. Nebuchadnezzar set up a golden image, 60 cubits high, in a field, and ordered all princes to attend upon its dedication and for the worship thereof. And the herald called out: You shall worship the image, and you who do not do so, will in this same hour be sent to the oven of the blazing fire. And they all worshipped it, except the servants of Daniel. For this they were accused before the king. Whereupon an oven was lighted sevenfold; and in it they were thrown, bound and fully clad. But the flames killed the men who put them into the oven. And the angel of the Lord entered the oven like a blowing wind of mist, and refreshed them. Thereupon the three children praised and sanctified the Lord God, as with a single mouth.[In the reign of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar made war on Judah, taking the king prisoner. He besieged and took Jerusalem and carried off many of the people as captives, including Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, all of the royal family. He caused these four to be carefully educated in the language and learning of the Chaldeans, so they might be employed at court. They were also given Chaldaean names: Daniel was called Belteshazzar; Hananiah, Shadrach; Mishael, Meshach; Azariah, Abed-ego. Their education completed, the king communed with them, finding them superior to all the magicians and astrologers of the realm. (Dan. 1:1-20) He made Daniel ruler of the whole province of Babylon, and chief of the governors over all the wise men of Babylon. At Daniel's request the other three were set over the affairs of the province of Babylon; but "Daniel sat in the gate of the king." (Dan. 2:48-49) And Nebuchadnezzar made a golden image threescore cubits in height and set it up in the plain, calling on all the princes, governors, etc., to come together and worship it, under pain of death in a fiery furnace for failure to obey. And at a given sign the multitudes fell down and worshipped; but certain Chaldaeans made complaint against Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-ego for not having done so. Before the king they admitted the charge and told him they would neither serve his gods nor worship his image. The king ordered the furnace to be heated "one seven times more than it was wont to be heated." The accused were thrown into it. The terrific heat killed the men who threw them in, but they themselves remained unscathed, and while in the midst of the flames sang the praises of the Lord (Dan. 3:1-30). The king recognizing the power of their God and released them.]
Jehozadak (Iosedech), the priest, a son of Seraiah (Azaria), was, when the Lord through Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Judah and Jerusalem by force, taken captive with others to Babylonia. Some say he was Ezdra, the writer and priest, or, perchance his brother.[Jehozadek was the son of the high priest Seraiah, who was murdered by Nebuchadnezzar (II Kings 25:21). He was carried into captivity and never became high priest, but his son, Jeshua, attained to this office, and his descendants held it until Alcimus. He is more frequently called Jozadak or Josedech.]
The Priestly Line is here continued from Folio LIII verso, which there ended with Shallum (Sellum, misprinted "Bellum"). We resume:
The prophets are resumed from folio LIII verso:
The Men in the Fiery Furnace--Mizahel, Hananiah (Ananias), and Azariah (Azarias)--are here depicted in the blazing oven or furnace, which among the Chaldaeans was a device used for capital punishment (Jer. 29:22; Dan. 3:19-26; Rev. 1:15; 9:2). Although the intended victims had attained to manhood before they were obliged to undergo this ordeal, they are here represented as three children, neatly clad as choir boys, no doubt to indicate that (according to the text of the Vulgate) they sang the praises of the Lord amidst the flames (see Text and Note, above).