The cuneiform inscriptions and the Old Testament - The Search For ...

BOOK OF DANIEL VIII. IX. X. HOSEA V. 137
chronology in relation to the Assyrian is an unsettled pro-
blem, and so is the date at which these oracles were com-
posed. In a subsequent passage (see the comment on X.
1 4) we have perhaps mention of a Salmanassar , who can
only have been Salmanassar III (783— 773); but, from
the way in which he is spoken-of, he must have been a
king who by that time belonged to the past. Hence when
Hosea refers to "king combatant" he must have meant one
of the immediate successors of Salmanassar, perhaps Asur-
dan, who in the years 755 and 754 made expeditions
against Chatarik (Hadrach) and Arpadda (Arpad) ;
see the
List of Governors. When we consider the difficulty of
reconciling the Assyrian chronology and the traditional one
of the Bible for this period, we can scarcely expect to
reach a definite conclusion. Nowack in his commentary
on this passage identifies 31J with Tiglath-Pileser II *.
* [The identification with Tiglath-Pileser II is certainly the more
probable hypothesis. Our knowledge of Asurdanilu's military enter-
prises is very limited, being derived from the notices in the List of
Governors. From these we infer that his powers of offence were
seriously crippled by revolts in Assyria itself. Under these circum-
stances it seems doubtful whether he was in a position to exercise
sufficient pressure on Palestine to extort the payment of a subsidy.
If Kamphausen's carefully elaborated chronological scheme be even
approximately correct (Chronolog. der Hebr. Konige p. 32), the date
proposed by Schrader 754 would fall within the reign of the powerful
and prosperous Jeroboam II. But this was not an age in which
Ephraim suffered from serious political distemper (comp. Hos. V. 13).
The notices in 2 Kings XIV. 25, 28 point in the opposite direction.
Nor does Juda's "wound" easily apply as a descriptive epithet during
the strong rule of the contemporary Uzziah at that particular time.
On the other hand the language of the prophet in this and other
analogous passages (VII. 9, 11, XI. 1, XIV. 3) clearly points to a later,
degenerate age, when the weak reigns of Menahem and Pekah placed
Israel under subservience to Assyria, her Eastern frontiers being
exposed to the victorious inroads of Tiglath-Pileser II.—The "wound