 |  |
constructed, for he had given command to renew the bulwarks of the great gate of his
city."
From the Assyrian inscription we learn that the amount of the tribute sent was
30 talents of gold and 800 talents of silver, but while in the scriptural record we also
read of 30 talents of gold, the amount of silver is stated to have been only 300 talents.
Learned commentators have exhibited a good deal of misplaced ingenuity in their
attempts to deal with this apparent discrepancy, yet it turns out that both records are
correct. Mr. Basil T. A. Evetts, formerly of the Assyrian Department of the British
Museum, says:
"The amount of the tribute in the two accounts . . . . . the Palestinian talent of silver
was exactly eight-thirds of the Babylonian: the talent of gold, on the other hand, was the
same in both countries."
We learn from II Kings 18: 17 that
"The king of Assyria sent Tartan and Rabsaris and Rabshakeh from Lachish to King
Hezekiah with a great host against Jerusalem."
These titles can be identified in the inscription of the monuments, and the O.T. record
is seen to be true in every minute particular. There is no difficulty in the title "Tartan",
which is easily identified as the Turtanu of the inscriptions, the meaning of which is
"Commander-in-Chief". The titles Rabsaris and Rabshakeh, however, have been the
subject of conjecture and criticism. Jewish commentators regarded the words as being
Hebrew, translating them, "Chief of the Eunuchs" and "Chief Cup-bearer", but these
speculations have been entirely discredited, for Rab-shakeh has now been discovered to
be an old Sumerian word, found in the Assyrian inscriptions as Rab-sa-rish, "Chief of the
Captains". It is found in an inscription of Tiglath-pileser II, as the title of a trusted
statesman whom that monarch sent to Tyre on a mission similar to that indicated in
II Kings 18:: "My officer, the Rabsak, I dispatched to Tyre."
We have seen that the old Sumerian Rab-sa-rish appears in Assyrian as Rabshak, and
some reader may have jumped to the conclusion that here we have also the Rabsaris of
II Kings 18: 17. This has not escaped the eye of the critics, but such jumping to
conclusions has once again proved to be wrong; the facts showing the Scriptures to be
right. Dr. Winkler and his followers were not slow in attributing to the Scriptures "a
blunder", whereas the blunder was their own, for the Rabsaris which they said was not on
the monuments was there all the time. A brick in the British Museum gives an Aramaean
translation of an Assyrian inscription, and reads: "In the eponymy of the Rabsaris,
Nabusarusar." As this date is the last year of Sennacherib's reign, there is every
probability that we have the name of the official who stood before the walls of Jerusalem
with Rabshakeh. Dr. Pinches has since discovered that Rab-sa-rasu is "Chief of the
Heads".