Isa 47:6 is usually taken to refer to the sixth century Babylonian captivity. Critical scholars take it as an utterance of Second Isaiah living in Babylon; conservative scholars take it as a long range prediction of such captivity. How can this question of the time of utterance be determined?
“I was wroth with my people, I have polluted mine inheritance, and given them into thine hand: thou didst shew them no mercy; upon the ancient hast thou very heavily laid thy yoke.” Isa 47:6
This text may refer to a deportation of Judeans to Babylon in 701 by the Assyrians for several reasons:
1) There is enough time for the deportation from the cities of Judah to have taken place and for the exiles to have settled down under the servitude of indigenous Babylonians.
2) God’s heritage was Jacob/Israel (2 Kgs 21:14), and it is not said that Babylon has polluted God’s inheritance. In 701 Assyria had polluted God’s sanctuary (the land). The description that God’s inheritance was polluted implies a presence in the land of a conqueror (e.g. Jer 16:18). Instead, Judean captives were delivered into the hand of Babylon by the Assyrians.
3) The utterance envisions a failure of the Babylonians to return their captives. This is indicated by the motif of “mercy” (~xr) which is used elsewhere to indicate the merciful act of sending captives home:
“For if ye turn again unto the Lord, your brethren and your children shall find compassion (~xr) before them that lead them captive, so that they shall come again into this land…” 2 Chron 30:9
The point being made in Isa 47:6 is that Babylon took the captives and instead of returning them, they indentured them; Isaiah is not describing the harsh treatment of slaves during seventy years of captivity; it is the choice that the Babylonians made to receive the people that the prophet emphasizes.
4) It is next said that Babylon did not “lay these” to her heart; the KJV interprets the demonstrative as “these things” but it could equally be “these people”—the ones upon which Babylon had had no compassion in her heart (cf. Isa 49:12, 21).
5) Babylon had also failed to remember the “latter end of it” (the Hebrew is singular). The latter end of God’s wrath with his people was the defeat of Assyria and their restoration in the land. Therefore, Babylon ought to have treated his people with kindness and not indentured them. Because they had done this and because Babylon had boasted that she would not be a widow and loose her children, of which she accused Jerusalem, then she would be destroyed. This happened in 689 in Sennacherib’s last campaign; it did not happen by the hand of Cyrus.
In terms of their history, Babylon did fall suddenly in 689 to Sennacherib’s army. Unlike Cyrus’ capture of Babylon which was peaceful,[1] Sennacherib’s final capture of the city was devastating:
“The city and its houses, foundation and walls, I destroyed, I devastated, I burned with fire. The wall and outer-wall, temples and gods, temple towers of brick and earth, as many as there were, I razed and dumped them into the Arahtu canal.”[2]
Moreover, the gods of Babylon were removed at this time, and the statue of Marduk was taken to Nineveh.
“The gods dwelling therein,—the hands of my people took them, and they smashed them. Their property and goods they seized.”[3]
In terms of Sennacherib’s early campaign in the south (704-702), Babylon had not been destroyed; the temples of the gods had not been affected. After the Chaldeans rebelled in 694, and killed Sennacherib’s son, Assyria turned its attention to Babylon; in 689, Sennacherib dealt a decisive blow to the city. The terms of Isaiah’s prophecy were realized: fire, widowhood, and loss of children.[4]
These points establish that it is an eighth century Babylonian captivity that is described. It is not a prediction of the sixth century captivity, although Isaiah of Jerusalem had made such a predication (Isaiah 39).
Is there additional evidence in the oracle as a whole for this reading? The catalyst for uttering such anti-Babylonian oracles in the days of Hezekiah would have been the visit of the Babylonian envoys, which can be dated to 700-699 at the latest.[5] This visit implies that the language of diplomacy might have been used by Isaiah of Jerusalem in his opposition to any Babylonian alliance; Isaiah 47 illustrates such language.
The Language of Diplomacy
1) The prophet “invites” Babylon to “come down and sit” (v. 1). This implies a meeting between Yahweh and Babylon. Hence, Yahweh asserts, “I will not meet thee ([gp[6]) a man” (v. 3). The invitation to meet is conveyed in a mocking tone. Babylon is invited to sit on the ground because there was “no throne”, and this is a jibe indicating that Merodach-Baladan had no throne at the time of the meeting. The invitation to “come” (dry) implies that Babylon is to join Yahweh in the dust; it is not addressed to Babylon at a distance: it is not the command to “sit down” in the dust. As such, this expression does not naturally describe the fall of Babylon to Cyrus, which did not involve a “coming” and “sitting” in the dust. Babylon lost none of her regal status in Cyrus’ capture.
The removal of Merodach-Baladan from the throne of Babylon was partly achieved in the campaign of 702, when Sennacherib replaced him with Bêl-ibni.[7] However, Sennacherib clearly felt it necessary to wage a further campaign in the south during 700 in order to establish Assyrian order. In this campaign, he placed Assur-nâdin-shum, his eldest son, on the throne. The language of his record states, “I placed on his royal throne Assur-nâdin-shum, my oldest son, offspring of my loins. I put him in charge of the wide land of Sumer and Akkad”.[8] Within the context of the record, it is Merodach-Baladan who figures as Sennacherib’s opponent. The expression “his royal throne” therefore betrays Sennacherib’s political perspective—that the throne of Babylon was still that of Merodach-Baladan. This fourth campaign (following so soon after the first campaign) settled the issue of the monarchy for Sennacherib—his son was to reign in peace for about six years; this reign began in 700 at the time of the visit of the Babylonian envoys.
2) The place for discussion is the “dust” and “earth”. This motif of “dust” is used of a people suffering under the adverse conditions of war and invasion. In Isaiah the term is used of the effects of the Assyrian invasion upon the people (Isa 25:12, 26:5, 29:4, 52:2).[9] As such it is an appropriate description of the land in the aftermath of a war. The word pair “dust-earth” occurs elsewhere only in Job 39:14, Isa 25:12, and Lam 2:10. In these texts there is, variously, the destruction of a city’s fabric (Isa 25:12), the humbling of Jerusalem’s rulers (Lam 2:10), and the ostrich’s nesting pattern.[10] The prophet therefore is inviting Babylon to come and sit down in what was called “dust” and “earth” but which had been delivered—Jerusalem and the land.
3) Babylon had a reputation for being “tender and delicate”, and this description picks up on the quality of her speech. For example, Prov 25:15 uses “tender” ($r) in the aphorism, “By long forbearing is a prince persuaded, and a soft ($r) tongue breaketh the bone” (cf. Job 40:27, Prov 15:1). In Isaiah’s oracle, it is a quality describing Babylon’s diplomatic overtures to Jerusalem. There appears to be an allusion to the “tender and delicate woman” of Deut 28:56, who is an evil woman, quite able to eat her children in a time of siege.
4) The claim of Babylon was to be the “queen of the kingdoms”, but Isaiah derides her and presents her as a female mill worker grinding flour (v. 2). This image is then combined with an image of a woman wading through rivers: “Remove your veil, strip off the skirt, Uncover the leg, cross the rivers” (v. 2, RSV). This combination is distinctive but may well reflect the fact that Merodach-Baladan fled from his hiding place in Babylonia to the marshes by boat when Sennacherib rolled down in 700 to re-establish Assyrian authority.[11]
5) Yahweh asserts that instead of meeting with Babylon he will take vengeance (v. 3). This could well be the vengeance promised for the aftermath of the Assyrian Crisis (Isa 34:8, 35:4, 59:17, 61:2, 63:4). As such, it is an assertion of independence, that Yahweh needed no alliance with Babylon. Yahweh had redeemed Judah from the captivity imposed by Assyria (v. 4).
6) Babylon is referred to as the “queen of kingdoms” and this propaganda could well reflect Babylon’s role as the leading city among the tribes of southern Mesopotamia. Its position was recognized by the Assyrian kings in their adoption of the dual title “king of Assyria and Babylon”. Isaiah’s assertion that Babylon would “no more” be called the “queen of the kingdoms” fits the context of Merodach-Baladan’s final defeat in 700. Instead, Babylon was to be silent and dumb and then go in (b) “darkness” (v. 5). This “darkness” is used by Isaiah as a figure of their lack of understanding about God and his intentions for his people (vv. 10, 12-13).[12]
The above points configure the language of vv. 1-5 as an address to the Babylonian envoys: they are “Babylon”. The oracle is not an address to the ruling elite of Babylon at the end of the exile. These words mock the envoys because the basis of their appeal to Judah had been taken away by Sennacherib in his renewed campaign of 700.
[1] ANET 315-316. J. Oates, Babylon, (London: Thames & Hudson, 1986), 131-135.
[2] Annals of Sennacherib, (trans. D. D. Luckenbill; Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 2005), 56, 83-84.
[3] Annals, 83.
[4] Oates, Babylon, 118-120.
[5] Most scholars date this visit to 702, but this is by no means certain and it can be argued that Hezekiah recovered from his sickness in 701 before the siege of Jerusalem was lifted, and it is this miraculous recovery on both counts that prompts the visit of the envoys.
[6] The semantic range of this word includes “meet, intercede”—Isa 53:12, 59:16, 64:4.
[7] Annals, 54, 57.
[8] Annals, 35, 76.
[9] See also Isa 2:10, 19, Mic 7:17. This figurative sense of “being reduced to dust” explains the assertion “dust shall be the serpent’s meat” (Isa 65:25): the Assyrian Leviathan Serpent (Isa 27:1) would be reduced to eating “dust” as that invader had reduced God’s people to dwelling in dust.
[10] The Ostrich is a figure for the elite of Judah in Job’s parable of the Assyrian Crisis; see D. Wolfers, Deep Things out of Darkness, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995), 221.
[11] Annals, 35. See Oates, Babylon, 115.
[12] “Darkness” is used as a figure for lack of understanding in texts such as Isa 5:20, 9:1, 29:18, 58:10, 59:9, and 60:2.
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One