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ART. IV.-CORESH AND CYRUS.

IN former papers we called the attention of our readers to that particular view of sacred history and chronology which regards the Coresh of Ezra (the deliverer of the captive Jews), not as the illustrious Cyrus of Herodotus, but as a powerful and princely satrap, deputed by Artaxerxes to be the ruler of Persia and Babylon. It has been recently stated that a continental scholar, Professor Ebrard, in reviewing an English work on prophecy, "has shewed that the twentieth of Artaxerxes, when Nehemiah built the walls of Jerusalem, synchronises with the first of Coresh, when the Jews returned from captivity; and that another foreign reviewer of the same work, Dr G. A. Klix, appears to accord with the view of Professor Ebrard." In the same work in which this communication is given, the writer adds that, in his opinion," the exact synchronism is obtained by comparing Ezra iv. 12, with Neh. iv. 6; and again, Ezra iii. 3-6, with Neh. iv. 2. The first of Coresh, therefore, which coincided with the twentieth of Artaxerxes, was B.C. 446."

The following are the (supposed) synchronous passages in Ezra and Nehemiah :

EZRA iv. 12.

:

"Be it known unto the king, (Artaxerxes) that the Jews which came up from thee to us are come unto Jerusalem, building the rebellious and the bad city, and have set up the walls thereof, and joined the foundations."

EZRA xii. 3-6.

"And (in the reign of Coresh) they set the altar upon his bases; for fear was upon them because of the people of those countries: and they offered burnt-offerings thereon unto the Lord, even burnt-offerings

NEHEMIAH iv. 6.

"So built we (in the reign of Artaxerxes) the wall; and all the wall was joined together unto the half thereof for the people had a mind to the work."

NEHEMIAH iv. 2.

"And (in the reign of Artaxerxes) Sanballat spake before his brethren and the army of Samaria, and said, What do these feeble Jews? will they fortify themselves? will they sacrifice? will they make an end in

corpora" (Eneid vi. 582); and Ovid to the "gigantas, immania monstra " (Fast, v. 35). Describing the wickedness of this age of giants, Ovid writes

"Tertia post illas successit ahenea proles

And again—

Sævior ingeniis et ad horrida promptior arma."-Metam. i 126.

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morning and evening.

They kept also the feast of tabernacles, as it is written. . . . From the first day of the seventh month began they to offer burnt-offerings unto the Lord. But the foundation of the temple of the Lord was not yet laid."

a day? will they revive the stones out of the heaps of the rubbish which are burnt?"

The two passages of Nehemiah may be regarded as synchronous, and as stating what occurred some time in the twentieth (or twenty-first) year of Artaxerxes. And as the second quotation from Ezra relates events which took place in the first (or second) year of Coresh, if these events really synchronised with those described in Neh. iv. 2, then, indeed, must the first of Coresh have sychronised with the twentieth of Artaxerxes, and the former must have been a satrap-prince deputed by the latter to administer the affairs of Babylon and Persia.

But if we are to suppose that Ezra iv. 12 synchronises, in any sense of the term, with Neh. iv. 6, then must we also suppose that the Artaxerxes of Ezra iv. 7-24 is to be identified with the Artaxerxes of Ezra vii. 1,* and with the Artaxerxes of Neh. ii. 1.

The sacred narrative, however, forbids this identification. For the Artaxerxes of Ezra vii. 1, in a royal letter, written in the seventh year of his reign, thus speaks concerning the temple at Jerusalem :-" Whatsoever is commanded by the God of heaven, let it be diligently done, for the house of the God of heaven: for why should there be wrath against the realm of the king and his sons?" (Ezra vii. 20). Accordingly, Ezra and his friends "delivered the king's commissions unto the king's lieutenants, and to the governors on this side the river; and they furthered the people, and the house of God" (Ezra viii. 36). On the contrary, we read in a letter sent to his officers in Samaria, by the Artaxerxes of Ezra iv. 11, a peremptory command to stop the Jews who were in Jerusalem from proceeding with their work-" Give ye now commandment to cause these men (the Jews) to cease, and that this city be not builded, until another commandment shall be given from me" (Ezra iv. 21). And what was the result of this letter?" Now when the copy of king Artaxerxes' letter was read before Rehum, and Shimshai the scribe, and their companions, they went up in haste to Jerusalem unto the Jews, and made them cease by force and power. Then ceased the

* It was proved in this Journal (No. xxvi. p. 42) to be highly probable that the Artaxerxes of Ezra vii. 1 was identical with the Artaxerxes of Nehemiah.

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work of the house of God, which is at Jerusalem. So it ceased unto the second year of the reign of Darius king of Persia" (Ezra iv. 23, 24). Hence, since no royal letter was sent, during the remainder of his reign, to Jerusalem, to encourage the Jews to build their temple or city, this Artaxerxes cannot possibly be identified with the Artaxerxes of Ezra vii. 1, or with Nehemiah's king of the same name. And we thus learn that the transactions recorded in Ezra iv. 12, do not synchronise with those of Neh. iv. 6.

Again, the temple was finished before the twentieth of Artaxerxes. For if the house of the Lord had still been unfinished and neglected, such a state of things would have certainly formed no slight portion of Nehemiah's complaint and sorrow. It is evident, however, from the history, that Nehemiah, when at Jerusalem, was occupied in completing the wall of the city. And when we read the following words (Neh. viii. 16)" So the people went forth and brought branches, and made themselves booths, every one upon the roof of his house, and in their courts, and in the courts of the house of God," it appears to be manifest that the second temple had certainly been rebuilt before the twentieth of Artaxerxes. But the accession of the Coresh of Ezra to the sovereign power in Babylon was prior to the laying of the foundation of the temple (Ezra iii. 6), and therefore must have been some years previous to the twentieth of Artaxerxes.

Again, "Ezra the scribe and priest," who is mentioned in Neh. viii. 1, 2, was doubtless identical with the scribe and priest of the same name of whom we read in the book of Ezra. And as this Ezra "went up from Babylon to Jerusalem," with a most friendly royal letter, in the seventh year of Artaxerxes,* "the king" (Ezra vii. 6, 7), we may safely conclude that this Artaxerxes cannot be identified with the Artaxerxes of Ezra iv. 7, and that it is almost certain that he was no other than the Artaxerxes of Nehemiah. In the letter in question, the king commands "Ezra to buy, speedily, bullocks, rams, and lambs, with their meat-offerings and their drink-offerings, and offer them upon the altar of the house of your God which is in Jerusalem" (Ezra vii. 17). It is plain, from the terms of this royal injunction, that the second temple had been already rebuilt before the seventh year of Artaxerxes; and therefore,

* In p. 42 of No. xxvi., it is shewn that Xerxes was probably absent on his disastrous expedition against Greece, during the greater part of his fifth year, the whole of his sixth, and at least six months of his seventh year; that he was therefore not the Ahasuerus of Esther; and that it is scarcely possible that Ezra should have asked or received a letter from this king in the seventh year of his reign.

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at least thirteen years before his twentieth year, which year, according to Professor Ebrard, should synchronise with the first year of Coresh, when the Jews returned from captivity. Thus Ezra iii. 3-6 is not synchronous with Neh. iv. 2.

Hence it is evident that the Persian king, in whose reign the building of the second temple was completed, preceded Nehemiah's Artaxerxes on the Persian throne. But when we study the fifth and sixth chapters of the book of Ezra, together with the introductory portions of Haggai and Zechariah, we discover that the building of the second temple was resumed in the second, and completed in the sixth year of Darius king of Persia. Whether or not Darius was the immediate predecessor of Artaxerxes is not stated by Ezra, and must be learned from secular history. We seem, however, certainly to discover from the Scriptures only, without any reference whatever to profane historians, the following facts:

Coresh, king of Persia and Babylon (Ezra v. 13), on becoming sovereign of Babylon, gave permission to the Jews to return into Judea, and rebuild their temple, of which the foundation was laid certainly not later than the second of Coresh. As soon as they had begun to build the house of God, the Gentile colonists who had been placed in Samaria interfered," and hired counsellors to frustrate the purpose of the Jews all the days of Coresh king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius king of Persia." Coresh was thus the supreme and independent king of Persia, as was Darius afterwards; he continued to reign some time (whether through a shorter or longer period) after the commencement of the building of the second temple; and, in all human probability (so far as this Scriptural narrative is to guide us), he continued to be the supreme king of Persia and Babylon until his death. It does not seem possible to draw any other conclusion from the book of Ezra than that between Coresh and Darius two other supreme kings of Persia and Babylon reigned, whose names and order of succession were Ahasuerus and Artaxerxes (Ezra iv. 6, 7, 24). The Darius of the second temple was the immediate successor of this Artaxerxes. We find, indeed, another supreme king of Babylon and Persia named Artaxerxes, mentioned by Ezra (vii. 1) and Nehemiah (ii. 1). We know, from comparing together the statements of these two writers, that this latter Artaxerxes was a different king of Persia and Babylon from the former king of the same name (Ezra iv. 7), and that he reigned after the Darius of the second temple. Confining ourselves to the sacred history, we

* See No. xxv., p. 411.

might think it to be probable that the latter Artaxerxes was the immediate successor of Darius; but we could not decide this point without the assistance of the secular historians. Before, however, we apply to these, we must notice some additional Scripture statements.

(a.) It may assist us in our endeavours to ascertain the chronology of the reign of the Darius of the second temple, to bear in mind the following fact:-The returned Jews finished the building of the second temple in their month Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of this Darius. In the next month, Abib, they celebrated the passover "with joy ;" and in their public expressions of thanksgiving to the Lord, these returned Jews appear to have spontaneously and unanimously applied to Darius the title of king of Assyria (Ezra vi. 22).

(8.) In the book of the prophet Zechariah (ii. 12), we find that in the second year of this Darius, the angel of the Lord thus addressed the Most High:-" O Lord of hosts, how long wilt thou not have mercy upon Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, against which thou hast had indignation these threescore and ten years?" Hence, about seventy years before the second year of this Darius, there must have been some special manifestation of the divine indignation against Jerusalem, whose effects had not entirely ceased at the time in which the angel thus addressed the Lord.

(y) We cannot doubt that the Coresh of Ezra was the Coresh of Isaiah; and that the decree which was issued by him to rebuild the temple at Jerusalem was in fulfilment of the Divine prediction and promise in Isa. xliv. 28. And what, we ask, must have been the previous career of this same Coresh, in order to fulfil the Divine promise and prediction in Isa. xlv. 1-4? Before restoring the captive Jews, Coresh, the deliverer, must, by the special aid of the Most High, have subdued nations, and taken the city of Babylon, and cast her down from imperial supremacy and independent dominion. For it is scarcely possible to doubt (when we study the preceding and succeeding context) that Isaiah is here speaking of the fall of Babylon before the victorious arms of Coresh, at the head of the hosts of Elam and Media (Isa. xxi. 2), from that imperial dominion under the family of Nebuchadnezzar, of which we read in the book of the prophet Daniel, as well as in the predictions of Isaiah.

(8.) Again, we read (2 Chron. xxvi 20) "that the Jews. were carried away by Nebuchadnezzar to Babylon, where. they were servants to him and his sons, until the reign of the kingdom of Persia, to fulfil the word of the Lord by the

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