In today’s lecture we talked about Hezekiah’s Jerusalem, the expansion of the city, and the Assyrian Empire. Prof. Cargill also announced that the midterm exam would be bumped back to next Thursday the 3rd of February. Paper 1 will still be due Tuesday the 1st.
First, we discussed the separation of Judah and Israel into two kingdoms. Jerusalem was the capital of Judah in the South. There was much dispute about where to worship and the Bible is often critical of the northern tribes of Israel for building alternate places of worship because it is written from the Southern perspective. We found out though that there is evidence of alternate sites of worship in both the North and South. Around the same time the Assyrian Empire was rising, which lead to increased urbanization.
The Assyrians were crazy warriors that were feared by all. Their military tactics were brutal and merciless. They would not only kill their enemies, they would mutilate the bodies to send a message. When they took over a city, if they did not kill everybody they would deport them from their own land. For this reason many people fled smaller settlements in favor of larger cities that had walls and other defense systems. This led to a drastic increase in population for Jerusalem as people came in to seek shelter from the Assyrians. As we closed the lecture we were discussing the evidence that Hezekiah was preparing for a rebellion from Assyria by stocking up on food and supplies expecting a siege on the city.
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