12 A History of Judaism
the history of the following generations of the Hebrew kings is punc-
tuated in Josephus’ account by the interventions of great empires (Egypt,
Assyria and Babylonia) as well as of the lesser powers of the region,
especially the kings of Syria and Damascus, and by civil war between
the kings in Jerusalem and the kings of the Israelites with their new cap-
ital in Samaria to the north. The fate of the kingdom of the Israelites
was sealed when the king of Assyria learned that the king of Israel had
attempted to make an alliance with Egypt to oppose Assyrian expan-
sion. After a siege of three years, the city of Samaria was taken by storm
and all the ten tribes which inhabited it were transported to Media and
Persia. Foreigners were imported to take possession of the land from
which the Israelites had been expelled. Josephus, the Jerusalem priest,
shows no sympathy: it was a just punishment for their violation of the
laws and rebellion against the dynasty of David. The imported foreign-
ers, ‘called “Cuthim” in the Hebrew tongue and “Samaritans” by the
Greeks’, adopted the worship of the Most High God who was revered
by the Jews.^11
In contrast to Samaria, Jerusalem was preserved at this time against
Assyrian attack by the piety of its king Hezekiah. But Jerusalem too was
eventually to fall victim to the overwhelming military might of a great
empire. Trapped between the expansionary ambitions of the Babylo-
nians, the successor empire to the Assyrians, and the power of Egypt to
the south, a series of kings in Jerusalem tried to play one side against the
other, but ultimately failed to ensure security. After a horrific siege of
Jerusalem, King Sacchias (called Zedekiah in the Bible) was captured,
blinded and taken off to Babylon by the Babylonian king Nebuchad-
nezzar. The Temple and palace in Jerusalem were razed to the ground,
and the people were transplanted to Babylonia, leaving all of Judaea
and Jerusalem deserted for seventy years.^12
Josephus did not have much to inform his readers about the fortunes
of the Jews in Babylonia beyond the accurate prophecy of Daniel, first
in the court of Nebuchadnezzar and then – many years later, when Bab-
ylon was under siege by Cyrus, king of Persia, and Darius, king of
Media – in the court of Belshazzar. Daniel correctly interpreted the
meaning of obscure words which had appeared on the wall of the din-
ing hall in the midst of a feast. The words signified that God would
break up the kingdom of Babylon between the Medes and the Persians.
Daniel became a great figure in the court of Darius and built at Ecbatana
in Media a fortress ‘which was a very beautiful work and wonderfully
made, and remains and is preserved to this day ... In this fortress they