The Cuneiform inscriptions and the Old Testament; - The Search For ...

SECOND BOOK OF KINGS XVII. 257
too described the final overthrow of the Syrian kingdom
and that Tiglath-Pileser made particular reference to a
wholesale deportation of the inhabitants.
Rezin he slew. This too, as 1 have already remarked,
Rawlinson found reported on a tablet of Tiglath-Pileser.
But unfortunately this plate was left behind in Asia and
has since been lost without leaving a trace behind it. See
G. Smith in Lepsius' Zeitsch. ibid. p. 14.
10. l^hen King Ahaz advanced to DamasJcus to meet Tig-
lath-Pileser. There, it may be presumed, the Great King,
after the capture of the city in 732 B. C, appointed a meet-
ing of all tributary princes, the same, we may be sure, as
those given above in the list p. 249. Among these was
Jahuhazi i. e. Ahaz of Juda. Whether the list, in one of
the injured places, also contained the name of Pekah of
Samaria must remain uncertain; see G. Smith ibid. p. 15.
XVII. 1. In the 1^^^ year of Ahaz— Hoshea , son of
Ela, became king at Samaria over Israel. As I have
observed above (p. 251) the name of Hoshea in the form
A-u-si-' has been discovered upon a fragment, the text
of which has been lithographed in III Rawl. 10. From
this we also learn that Hoshea came to the throne simply
with the permission, and as the vassal, of the Assyrian.
But the Bible, in describing the succession to the throne,
gives no hint * of any cooperating influence exerted by the
Assyrian; the passage XVII. 3 "and Hoshea became subject 266
to him (the Assyrian Great King)" refers to Salmanassar.
* Dan. Haigh in Lepsius' Zeitschrift 1871. p. 70 concludes from the
mention of Hanno of Gaza and of Samsieh, queen of the Arabs, in the
passage referred-to above (III Eawl. 10), that the whole of this mutilated
inscription was not one of Tiglath-Pileser's, but of Sargon-Salman-
assar's (these two rulers he regards as one and the same). But this
inference is precipitate, since we find the queen Samsieh of Arabia
17