Other bands carried fire and sword through the town.
[“A sword is upon the Chaldeans, saith the Lord, and upon the inhabitants of Babylon, and upon her princes, and upon her wise men. A sword is upon the liars; and they shall dote; a sword is upon her mighty men; and they shall be dismayed. A sword is upon their horses, and upon their chariots, and upon all the mingled people that are in the midst of her; and they shall become as women.”
“Thus saith the Lord of Hosts: The broad walls of Babylon shall be utterly broken, and her high gates shall be burned with fire; and the people shall labor in vain, and the folk in the fire, and they shall be weary.” <245035>Jeremiah 50:35-37; <245158>Jeremiah 51:58.]
25. “When the morning came, Cyrus found himself undisputed master of the city, which, if it had not despised his efforts, might with the greatest ease have baffled them.”
[“Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, to open before him the two-leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut.” <234501>
Isaiah 45:1.]
“Thus perished the Babylonian Empire.”
[“And it shall be, when thou hast made an end of reading this book, that thou shalt bind a stone to it, and cast it into the midst of Euphrates; and thou shalt say, Thus shall Babylon sink, and shalt not rise from the evil that I will bring upon her; and they shall be weary. Thus far are the words of Jeremiah.” <245106>Jeremiah 51:63, 64.] f67
26. Cyrus’s own account of the conquest of Babylon, somewhat mutilated,
In justice and righteousness has he governed them. Merodach the great lord, the restorer of his people, beheld with joy the deeds of his vicegerent who was righteous in hand and heart.
To his city of Babylon he summoned his march; he bade him also take the road to Babylon; like a friend and a comrade he went at his side.
The weapons of his vast army, whose number, like the waters of a river, could not be known, were marshaled in order, and it spread itself at his side.
Without fighting and battle (Merodach) caused him to enter into Babylon;
his city of Babylon he spared; in a hiding-place Nabonidos the king, who revered him not, did he give into his hand.
The men of Babylon, all of them, (and) the whole of Sumer and Accad, the nobles and the high-priest, bowed themselves beneath him; they kissed his feet; they rejoiced at his sovereignty; their faces shone.
The lord (Merodach) who through trust therein raises the dead to life, who benefits all men in difficulty and fear, has in goodness drawn nigh to him, has made strong his name. At that time I entered into Babylon in peace.
With joy and gladness in the palace of the princes I founded the seat of dominion. Merodach the great lord enlarged my heart; the son[s] of Babylon and... on that day I appointed his ministers(?).
My vast army spread itself peacefully in the midst of Babylon; throughout [Sumer and] Accad I permitted no gainsayer.
Babylon and all its cities in peace I governed. The sons of Babylon, [and...
gave me ?] the fulness of [their] heart[s], and my yoke they bore, and their lives, their seat, (and) their ruins I restored. I delivered their prisoners. For my work... Merodach the great lord, the... , established a decree; unto me, Cyrus, the king, his worshiper, and Kambyses (my) son, the offspring of my heart, [and to] all my people he graciously drew nigh, and in peace before them we duly... All the king(s) who inhabit the high places of all regions from the Upper Sea to the Lower Sea, f70 the inhabitants of the in[lands], the kings of Syria, (and) the inhabitants of tents, all of them brought their rich tribute and in Babylon kissed my feet. From [the city of]... to the cities of Assur and Istar-Sumeli (?), f71 (and) Accad, the land of Umhas, f72 the cities of Zamban, Me-Turnut, (and) Dur-ili, as far as the
frontier of Quti, f73 the cities [which lie upon] the Tigris, whose seats had been established from of old, I restored the gods who dwelt within them to their places, and I founded (for them) a seat that should be long-enduring;
all their peoples I collected and restored their habitations.
And the gods of Sumer and Accad whom Nabonidos, to the anger of (Merodach) the lord of the gods, had brought into Babylon, by the
command of Merodach the great lord, in peace in their sanctuaries I settled in seats according to (their) hearts. May all the gods whom I have brought into their own cities intercede daily before Bel and Nebo that my days be long, may they pronounce blessings upon me, and may they say to Merodach my lord: Let Cyrus the king, thy worshiper, and Kambyses his son, [accomplish the desire?] of their heart; [let them enjoy length?] of days... I have settled [the peoples] of all countries in a place of rest.” F74 27. For political reasons this respect to the gods of Babylon was advisable.
But later Cyrus’s own religious views underwent a change; and with his successors there came another religion entirely; so that “the fall of Babylon was also the fall of an ancient, widely spread, and deeply venerated
religious system. Not, of course, that the religion suddenly disappeared or ceased to have votaries, but that, from a dominant system, supported by all the resources of the State, and enforced by the civil power over a wide extent of territory, it became simply one of the many of the tolerated beliefs, exposed to frequent rebuffs and insults, and at all times
overshadowed by a new and rival system — the comparatively pure creed of Zoroastrianism. The conquest of Babylon by Persia was, practically, if not the death-blow, at least a severe wound, to the sensuous idol-worship which had, for more than twenty centuries, been the almost universal religion in the countries between the Mediterranean and the Zagros Mountain Range. The religion never recovered itself — was never reinstated. It survived a longer or a shorter time, in places. To a slight extent it corrupted Zoroastrianism; but on the whole, from the date of the fall of Babylon, it declined. Bel bowed down; Nebo stooped [<234601>Isaiah 46:1]; Merodach was broken in pieces [<245002>Jeremiah 50:2]. Judgment was done upon the Babylonian graven images; and the system, of which they formed a necessary part, having once fallen from its proud pre-eminence, gradually decayed and vanished.”
[“Babylon is fallen, is fallen; and all the graven images of her gods hath he broken unto the ground. O my threshing, and the corn of
my floor; that which I have heard of the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, have I declared unto you.” <232109>Isaiah 21:9, 10.] f75
28. “So long as Babylon, “the glory of kingdoms,” ‘the praise of the whole earth,’ retained her independence, with her vast buildings, her prestige of antiquity, her wealth, her learning, her ancient and grand religious system, she could scarcely fail to be in the eyes of her neighbors the first power in the world, if not in mere strength, yet in honor, dignity, and reputation.
Haughty and contemptuous herself to the very last, she naturally imposed on men’s minds, alike by her past history and present pretensions; nor was it possible for the Persian monarch to feel that he stood before his subjects as indisputably the foremost man upon the earth until he had humbled in the dust the pride and arrogance of Babylon. But, with the fall of the great city, the whole fabric of Semitic greatness was shattered. Babylon became
‘an astonishment and a hissing,’ — all her prestige vanished, — and Persia stepped manifestly into the place, which Assyria had occupied for so many centuries, of absolute and unrivaled mistress of Western Asia.” F76
CHAPTER 4.
EMPIRE OF MEDIA AND PERSIA - DARIUS THE MEDE AND CYRUS.
AND Darius the Median took the kingdom, being about threescore and two years old;” f81and reigned two years, 538-536 B.C.
2. Belshazzar having been associated with his father, Nabonadius, in the