oeiental discoveries on old testament mSTORY. 33 



in this iiisciiption of Sennacherib's there is no mention of the 

 siege. In view of the importance of the phice an omission of 

 that sort seems exceeding strange, and an inference might have 

 been drawn that these Bible statements at least wereuiihistorical. 

 But Layard discovered upon the walls of .Sennacherib's palace 

 at Nineveh sculptured slabs representing the siege of a large 

 city in active progress. On one of the slabs the king is seen 

 enthroned and a procession of captives proceeding towards him 

 from tlie gate of the city. Over the king's head stands the 

 following inscription : " Sennaclierib, king of nations, king of 

 Assyria, sitting on the throne, causes the spoils of the city of 

 Lachish to pass before him."* 



We are also enabled to test the value of the statements 

 which are made so freely regarding the alleged mythical 

 character of that part of Kings which lecords the history of 

 Elijah and Elisha. Long ago De Wette maintained that " the 

 whole stoiy of Elijah and Elisha is derived, directly or in- 

 directly, irom legends of the people or of the schools of the 

 prophets"; and again, "The Book contains numerous mythical 

 passages. In some of them the mythical portion is very con- 

 spicuous. 8uch are . . . the story of Elijah. . . . The con- 

 tinuation and conclusion of the history of Elijah ahd his 

 successor are filled w itli mythical narratives."! ^ This may be 

 taken as lepresentative of critical opinion. Now, in one of 

 these supposed myths, we find a siege of Samaria pressed by 

 lienhadad king of Syiia (2 Kings vi, 24); and we are told that 

 the siege was raised through an alarm which seized upon the 

 Syrian army that the Israelites had hired against them " the 

 kings of the Hittites and the kings of the Egyptians," and that 

 these were then rushing against them (vii, 6). This incidental 

 ■ reference was regarded for a long time OS sustaining the criti- 

 cal charges. The Scripture makes frequent refeiences to the 

 Hittites. But who were they ? Where was their location ? 

 And what had they achieved ? The utter silence of history 

 regarding the Hittite was lield to be eloquent ; for the silence 

 was said to be inexplicable if the Hittites had played the part 

 which the Bible assigns to them. Professor Sayce, referring to 

 tliis passage, wiites tliat the critics held the reference to the 

 Hittites " to be an error or an invention ; but h was only the 

 ignorance of the critic himself that was at fault ! " But even 

 so willing and capable a defender of Scripture as Keil could 



* Maspero, Tlistoire A ncienne des Peuples de V Orient^ p. 408. 

 t Introduction to the O.T.^ vol. ii, 184. 



