by
Damien F. Mackey
“Although,
other candidates for Jonah’s “king of Nineveh” do exist,
Adad-Nirari
III seems to be an interesting fit due to his little-known
monotheistic
revolution. For reasons unknown Adad-Nirari III chose Nabu,
the
Assyrian god of literacy, scribes and wisdom, as the sole god to be worshipped”.
Introduction
The one clear piece of
chronological evidence with which the Old Testament has availed us concerning the
prophet Jonah is that he prophesied regarding the military success of King
Jeroboam (II) of Israel (2 Kings 14:25): “[Jeroboam] was
the one who restored the boundaries of Israel from Lebo Hamath to the Dead
Sea, in accordance with the word of the Lord, the God of Israel,
spoken through his servant Jonah son of Amittai, the prophet from Gath
Hepher”.
This crucial piece of
information has encouraged biblical scholars, in search of an historical
identification for the “king of Nineveh” of Jonah 3:6, to investigate whatever
Assyrian kings were contemporaneous with the lengthy reign of Jeroboam II.
Proposed figures for the reign of
Jeroboam II have ranged from 793 BC to 746 BC:
“William
F. Albright has dated
his reign to 786–746 BC, while E.
R. Thiele says he was
coregent with Jehoash 793 to 782 BC and sole ruler 782 to 753 BC. …”.
Basically, then, the reign of Jeroboam II is thought to have spanned the greater
part of the first half of the C8th BC.
Scholars, turning next to the conventional neo-Assyrian king lists, will encounter
these following Assyrian kings who might qualify as being contemporaries of
Jeroboam II: List
of Assyrian Kings. A list of the kings in the Neo-Assyrian… | by Zack Duncan |
Medium
- Adad-nirari III (811–783 BC), Babylon became independent again during his reign.
- Shalmaneser IV (783–773 BC), son of Adad-nirari III.
- Ashur-dan III (773–755 BC), son of Adad-nirari III. ….
- Ashur-nirari V (755–745 BC), may have been deposed and killed by his successor.
Creationist Bill Cooper, on the other
hand, would mount a most enthusiastic case for:
- Tiglath-Pileser III (745–727 BC), Assyria became the supreme power in the Near
East under his reign. He successfully invaded Israel as recorded in 2
Kings 15:29.
for Jonah 3:6’s “king of Nineveh” (“The Historic Jonah”, EN Tech. J., vol. 2, 1986, pp. 105–116).
In conventional terms, this mighty king would be chronologically too late
to qualify.
Gerard Gertoux uniquely dates the Jonah incident to 824 BC, when (as he
thinks) Shalmaneser III lay dying and there was an insurrection against him in
Assyria:
(8)
Jonah vs King of Nineveh: Chronological, Historical and Archaeological Evidence
Whereas Bill Cooper’s reconstruction was too late for Jonah, conventionally
speaking, Gerard Gertoux’s albeit original effort sets the scene far too early.
Moreover, according to my reconstructions, Shalmaneser so-called III
reigned significantly later than during the conventional dates that have been
assigned to him.
See my Bibliography
at the end of this article.
Of the first four listed neo-Assyrian kings above, the two popular choices
for Jonah’s “the king of Nineveh” appear to be Adad-nirari III and Ashur-dan
III.
Zack Duncan, for example, who compiled this succession of Assyrian kings
(2024), had interestingly added to his listing of Ashur-dan III (emphasis
added):
- Ashur-dan III (773–755 BC), son of Adad-nirari III. The prophet Jonah
served during the time of King Jeroboam II in Israel (783–743 BC) and
likely visited Nineveh during this time.
Marc Madrigal, on the other hand, is one who has favoured, for the Book of
Jonah’s converted Ninevite king, Adad-nirari III.
Since I shall be coming to the same conclusion as has Marc Madrigal, but
via entirely different historical paths, I give here what he has written about
king Adad-nirari III: Adad-Nirari III: Jonah’s
Assyrian King?
Adad-Nirari III:
Jonah’s Assyrian King?
It is possible that the
unnamed deliverer who saved the kingdom of Israel from the oppression and
threat of the Arameans is none other than Adad-Nirari III himself.
Adad-Nirari III was king of the Assyrian Empire and
reigning roughly from 805-782 BCE. The Saba'a Stele of Adad-Nirari III
recording some of Adad-Nirari’s campaigns was discovered in 1905 in the Sinjar
Mountains of Syria.
The Stele dates from around 800 BCE and provides one
of the earliest archaeological records of the name Palestine (Pa-la-áš-tu). The
inscription mentions an Assyrian raid against the king of Aram and the details
of the eventual tribute received. The translation of the stele is as follows:
“In (my) fifth year of reign, when I took my seat on
the royal throne in might, I mobilized (the forces of my) land. (To) the wide
spreading armies of Assyria I gave the order to advance against Palashtu
(Palestine). I crossed the Euphrates at its flood. The wide-spreading, hostile
kings, who in the time of Shamshi-Adad, my father, had rebelled and withheld
their tribute. At the command of the gods Assur, Sin, Shamash, Adad, and Ishtar
my allies [terror] overwhelmed them and they laid hold of my feet and I received
tribute. I gave the command [to march against Aram] to Mari’ [Ishutup] in
Damascus, [his royal city]. I received 100 talents of gold and 1,000
talents of silver talents.”
The date and content of this Stele contains some
interesting parallels with 2 Kings 13. The events recorded in this
stele coincide with the reign Jehoahaz of Israel. William F. Albright dates his
reign to 815–801 BCE. E. R. Thiele suggests 814–798 BCE.
Saba'a Stele. Istanbul
Archaeology Museum. / Marc Madrigal
In 2 Kings 13:1-5 we read, “In the twenty-third
year of Joash the son of Ahaziah, king of Judah, Jehoahaz the son of Jehu
became king over Israel at Samaria, and he reigned seventeen years.
He did evil in the sight of the Lord, and followed the sins of Jeroboam
the son of Nebat, with which he made Israel sin; he did not turn from
them. So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and He
gave them continually into the hand of Hazael king of Aram, and into the
hand of Ben-hadad the son of Hazael. Then Jehoahaz entreated the
favor of the Lord, and the Lord listened to him; for He saw
the oppression of Israel, how the king of Aram oppressed
them. The Lord gave Israel a deliverer, so that
they escaped from under the hand of the Arameans; and the sons of Israel
lived in their tents as formerly.” (NASB)
It is possible that the unnamed deliverer who saved
the kingdom of Israel from the oppression and threat of the Arameans is none
other than Adad-Nirari III himself.
The parallelisms between the Biblical text and the
reign of Adad-Nirari III do not end here.
In 2 Kings 14 we have the first mention of the prophet Jonah, the son of
Amittai. The story of Jonah is considered by some scholars as an allegory. Some
even reject the historical figure of Jonah himself. Certainly it seems from the
text of 2 Kings 14 that Jonah was understood to be a
historical figure. Furthermore Jesus’ frequent quotes from Jonah seem to
suggest that for Jesus, Jonah was a real historical figure also.
In Luke 11:30 Jesus contrasts his
generation with the generation that lived in the time of Jonah, “For
as Jonah became a sign to the people of Nineveh, so will the Son of Man be
to this generation.” (ESV)
2 Kings 14 tells us that Jonah lived during the reign
of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel. William F. Albright dates his
reign to 786–746 BC, E. R. Thiele suggests that he was co-regent with Jehoash
793–782 BC and sole ruler 782–753 BCE.
Both of these dates fall within the reign of
Adad-Nirari III (805-782 BCE). Although, other candidates for Jonah’s “king of
Nineveh” do exist, Adad-Nirari III seems to be an interesting fit due to his
little-known monotheistic revolution. For reasons unknown Adad-Nirari III chose
Nabu, the Assyrian god of literacy, scribes and wisdom, as the sole god to be
worshipped.
In his book titled The Ancient World From c.
1400 to 586 B.C., Francis Nicole makes the following observation: “A
strange religious revolution took place in the time of Adad-nirari III, which
can be compared with that of the Egyptian Pharaoh Ikhnaton.
For an unknown reason Nabu (Nebo), the god of
Borsippa, seems to have been proclaimed sole god, or at least the principal
god, of the empire. A Nabu temple was erected in 787 B.C. at Calah, and on a
Nabu statue one of the governors dedicated to the king appear the significant
words, 'Trust in Nabu, do not trust in any other god'.”
Nicole continues: “The favorite place accorded Nabu in
the religious life of Assyria is revealed by the fact that no other god appears
so often in personal names. This monotheistic revolution had as short a life as
the Aton revolution in Egypt. The worshipers of the Assyrian national deities
quickly recovered from their impotence, reoccupied their privileged places, and
suppressed Nabu. This is the reason that so little is known concerning
the events during the time of the monotheistic revolution. Biblical chronology
places Jonah's ministry in the time of Jeroboam II, of Israel, who reigned from
793 to 753 B.C. Hence, Jonah's mission to Nineveh may have occurred in the
reign of Adad-Nirari III, and may have had something to do with his decision to
abandon the old gods and serve only one deity. This explanation can, however,
be given only as a possibility, because source material for that period is so
scanty and fragmentary that a complete reconstruction of the political and
religious history of Assyria during the time under consideration is not yet
possible.”
Under this scenario, if indeed Adad-Nirari III is the
king of Nineveh, it would seem reasonable to conclude that by sending
Jonah, the God of Israel was extending a hand of mercy to the very king that
had earlier delivered Israel from the oppression of the Arameans.
Jonah’s message led the population to repentance and
in their turn to monotheism perhaps they identified Jonah’s god with Nabu.
Although it is difficult to say with precise certainty if this is indeed the
nature of the events that unfolded, it nonetheless makes for a compelling
possibility!
Marc Madrigal has raised some
really intriguing points in his article.
What I
especially take from it, apart from my same conclusion that Adad-nirari III was
the very much sought for “king of Nineveh”, is the shock leaning towards
monotheism; something totally unexpected amongst the haughty, and utterly
pagan, kings of Assyro-Babylonia.
Long road to Jonah’s “King
of Nineveh”
When leading in to Marc Madrigal’s article above, I had stated that “I
shall be coming to the same conclusion as [he has], but via entirely different
historical paths”.
Almost miraculously, as it seems to me, Marc Madrigal has arrived at the
right conclusion about Adad-nirari III despite the seeming impossibility of
being able to align a hopelessly faulty neo-Assyrian chronology with an
improperly worked out history of biblical Israel.
There is so
much to say here.
Thankfully,
I have written articles whose references I can provide to save an enormous
amount of repetitive explanation. See my Bibliography at the end
of this article.
In a
nutshell, the thing is, the long-lived prophet Jonah made his famous prediction
about King Jeroboam II very early in his prophetic ministry; whereas his
mission to Nineveh occurred very late in his prophetic ministry.
By the time
that Jonah arrived in Nineveh, King Jeroboam II, and indeed the entire Jehu-ide
line, had died out.
And so had
died out all of the supposed kings of Assyria contemporaneous with Jeroboam II.
Even Bill Cooper’s late entry, Tiglath-pileser, had passed on.
All of those
in Zack Duncan’s list - except for Adad-nirari III, who is a special case.
Let me try
to explain.
So-called
‘Middle’ kingdom Assyro-Babylonian kings need to be folded into Neo kings.
That is a categorical
necessity of chronological revisionism.
For a long
time I had considered Adad-Nirari I/III to have been an early king, and had
accepted this list below from Marc Van de Mieroop’s book, A History of the Ancient Near East ca. 3000
-323 BC. - his “King Lists” towards the end of his book - as being a
perfect one for our period in question (p. 294):
Adad-nirari [I]
Shalmaneser [I]
Tukulti-Ninurta [I]
Assur-nadin-apli [I]
where Tukulti-Ninurta = Sennacherib and
Assur-nadin-apli = Ashurnasirpal = Esarhaddon.
This sequence accords perfectly with the
neo-Assyrian sequence given in Tobit 1: “Shalmaneser”; “Sennacherib”;
“Esarhaddon”. ….
But recently
I have come to realise that Adad-Nirari actually belongs at the bottom, not at
the top, of this list. And that that is the key to the true identity of
Adad-Nirari:
Adding
Adad Nirari to Shalmaneser as Assyrian kings needing to be re shuffled
(3) Adding Adad
Nirari to Shalmaneser as Assyrian kings needing to be re shuffled
And that is
not the only massive re-shuffling of kings needed as we course along the Long
road to Jonah’s “King of Nineveh”.
The full
identification of the prophet Jonah himself, relative to the kings of Judah and
Israel, is extremely involved as well:
De-coding
Jonah
And the list
of the kings of Israel needs shortening, too, with some of the names being
duplicates. I have only to recall a favourite equation of mine, enabling for
the last six named kings of Israel to be reduced to just three:
Zechariah (murdered) = Pekahiah (murdered);
Shallum (murderer-murdered) = Pekah (murderer-murdered);
Menahem (murderer) = Hoshea (murderer).
In other
words, for one to arrive at a complete, long-lived prophet Jonah and his
contemporaneous “king of Nineveh”, one needs to undertake a massive revision of
the kings of Israel and Judah, as well as those of Assyro-Babylonia.
We read
earlier that Marc Madrigal had gone so far as to propose that Adad-Nirari may
have been Israel’s “saviour” against the Syrians (Arameans) (cf. 2 Kings
13:5):
“It is possible that the
unnamed deliverer who saved the kingdom of Israel from the oppression and
threat of the Arameans is none other than Adad-Nirari III himself”.
But that era was far too
early for our (revised) Adad-Nirari.
The “saviour” was,
according to my own view, the Jehu-ide king of Israel, Jehoash:
An
Old Testament “saviour” of Israel
(7) An Old
Testament "saviour" of Israel
Having in mind that Adad-Nirari was so well distant from
King Jeroboam II, and from the “saviour” incident favoured for him by Marc
Madrigal, I had earlier remarked:
“Almost
miraculously, as it seems to me, Marc Madrigal has arrived at the right
conclusion about Adad-nirari III despite the seeming impossibility of being
able to align a hopelessly faulty neo-Assyrian chronology with an improperly
worked out history of biblical Israel”.
Now, returning
to that ‘Middle’ kingdom list of Assyrian kings about which I had initially
been so bullish:
Adad-nirari [I]
Shalmaneser [I]
Tukulti-Ninurta [I]
Assur-nadin-apli [I]
where Tukulti-Ninurta = Sennacherib and
Assur-nadin-apli = Ashurnasirpal = Esarhaddon.
This sequence accords perfectly with the
neo-Assyrian sequence given in Tobit 1: “Shalmaneser”; “Sennacherib”;
“Esarhaddon”. ….
I would now
update it as follows:
Shalmaneser = Shalmaneser
Tukulti-Ninurta = Sargon
II/Sennacherib
Adad-nirari = Esarhaddon
Esarhaddon was the king of Nineveh during whose
early rule I believe that the prophet Jonah came to Nineveh:
The ‘Jonah incident’ historically identified
(7) The 'Jonah incident'
historically identified
Hence, I can
likewise say that Adad-Nirari was the king of
Nineveh during whose early rule I believe that the prophet Jonah came to
Nineveh.
This, my recent de-coding of who Adad-Nirari III
really was, and when he actually lived – some two centuries later
than according to convention – has enabled for him to take his place as another
of those mighty alter egos of the Chaldean (not Assyrian) king,
Nebuchednezzar ‘the Great’.
Adad-Nirari was, all at once (to name a few), Ashurnasirpal:
King
Ashurnasirpal brings critically relevant elements to a reconstructed Jonah
(7) King
Ashurnasirpal brings critically relevant elements to a reconstructed Jonah
And he was Esarhaddon
(as noted above).
And he was Nebuchednezzar
(as noted above).
And he was Nabonidus.
An
unexpected trend towards a form of monotheism can be discerned amongst
Nebuchednezzar; Nabonidus; Adad-Nirari, as noted on another occasion as follows:
A religious revolution
A notable
revolution towards a monotheistic worship of the god, Nebo, that occurred
during the reign of Adad-Nirari III – somewhat akin to that of pharaoh Akhnaton
towards the Aton – was common as well to Adad-Nirari’s alter egos (in my
revision), e.g. King Nebuchednezzar’s Monotheistic Inscription (No. 15) and the
singular worship by King Nabonidus of the god, Sin:
Venerating the god Sin common to Nebuchednezzar’s main
‘alter egos’
(13) Venerating the god Sin common
to Nebuchednezzar's main 'alter egos'
In that article I considered, for
instance:
Nabonidus’s fanatical devotion to
god Sin
Previously I have written on this phenomenon:
‘God of gods’
Though it would be much
over-stating things to claim that King Nabonidus became a monotheist, there is
a definite progression in that direction in
the course of his
reign.
“Monotheistic Tendency” of Nebuchednezzar
Charles Boutflower has advanced a strong
argument in his book, In and Around the
Book of Daniel:
https://archive.org/stream/inaroundbookofda00boutuoft/inaroundbookofda00boutuoft_djvu.txt
for evidence of a trend towards a Marduk
(Merodach) monotheism in various inscriptions of Nebuchednezzar:
According, then, to this authority, No. 15 is the latest of the
inscriptions of Nebuchadnezzar, and the Merodach tendency
noticed by Langdon is of necessity a monotheistic tendency, for
Merodach, who, as we have seen, is always foremost of the gods,
appears in some passages of this inscription to stand alone.
Now it is just in these monotheistic passages, these " inserted
prayers "
and " changes of text," that we seem to see the work of the
real
Nebuchadnezzar.
Thus, immediately after the introductory
passage, which describes the position occupied by the king with
reference to Merodach and Nebo, there follows a hymn to those
divinities, col. i. 23 to ii. 39, extracted from inscriptions 19 and
14. But in the middle of this hymn we meet with a prayer
addressed to Merodach alone : col. i. 51 to ii. 11, and this prayer,
be it noted, is an entirely original addition, not found in any previous
inscription. Jastrow remarks with reference to it, "The con-
ception of Merodach rises to a height of spiritual aspiration,
which comes to us as a surprise in a religion that remained steeped
in polytheism, and that was associated with practices and rites
of a much lower order of thought." 2 This remarkable prayer
runs thus
"To Merodach my lord I prayed,
I addressed my supplication.
He had regard to the utterance of my heart,
I spake unto him:
'Everlasting prince,
Lord of all that is,
for the king whom thou lovest,
whose name thou proclaimest,
who is pleasing to thee :
direct him aright,
lead him in the right path !
I am a prince obedient unto thee,
the creature of thy hands,
thou hast created me,
and hast appointed me to the lordship of multitudes of people.
According to thy mercy, Lord, which thou bestowest upon
all of them,
cause them to love thy exalted lordship :
cause the fear of thy godhead to abide in my heart !
Grant what to thee is pleasing,
for thou makest my life’.” ….
And a similar exaltation of the god, Sîn, in the case of King Nabonidus, is a central
feature of Paul-Alain
Beaulieu’s book, The Reign of Nabonidus,
King of Babylon, 556-539 B.C. (1989).
Beaulieu has interpreted Nabonidus’s exaltation of the
moon god, Sîn, as “an outright usurpation of Marduk’s prerogatives”.
Sîn is the ilu/ilani sa ilani, “the god(s) of
the gods”.
This exalted invocation is
undoubtedly due to the influence of the prophet Daniel.
Now, similarly (and I do
not agree with the following in its entirety):
“A
strange religious revolution took place in the time of Adad-nirari III,
which
can be compared with that of the Egyptian Pharaoh Ikhnaton.
For
an unknown reason Nabu (Nebo), the god of Borsippa, seems to have
been
proclaimed sole god, or at least the principal god, of the empire”.
Francis
D. Nichol
Bibliography:
For the
revision of biblical and ancient history:
Chaotic
King Lists can conceal some sure historical sequences
(8) Chaotic King Lists can conceal
some sure historical sequences
Necessary
fusion of Hezekiah and Josiah
(8) Necessary fusion of Hezekiah
and Josiah
Last
six Kings of Israel were only three
(7) Last six Kings
of Israel were only three
For the
prophet Jonah and the Book of Jonah:
Jonah
3:6's “King of Nineveh”
(8) Jonah 3:6's
"King of Nineveh"
Jonah
3 historically based according to BibleHub
(8) Jonah 3
historically based according to BibleHub
Plant
that gave Jonah shade
(8) Plant that
gave Jonah shade
God
can raise up prophets at will - even from a shepherd of Simeon
(8) God can raise
up prophets at will - even from a shepherd of Simeon
A
north and south geography for the major prophet Isaiah
(8) A north and
south geography for the major prophet Isaiah
For Adad-nirari III:
Adding
Adad Nirari to Shalmaneser as Assyrian kings needing to be re shuffled
(8) Adding Adad
Nirari to Shalmaneser as Assyrian kings needing to be re shuffled
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