The Babylonian State

Lesson Passage: Daniel 5:1-31.

(See Note before Lesson Talk in Chapter XXVII.)

The teacher should read Rawlinson's Ancient Monarchies, Stanley's History of the Jewish Church, Encyclopædias.

Referring to the Map of the Exile in the Appendix, the reader will see the name Babylon applied to a comparatively small section of the greater Assyrian country. It is shaped somewhat like the State of Vermont, and lies about 340 miles long by 20 to 100 miles broad, and contains about 27,000 square miles, or a territory only three times that of Vermont. This small province, smaller than Scotland or Ireland, became the mistress of an extensive empire. On the fall of Assyria (625 B. C.), Media and Babylonia divided her territory between them. Babylon was then the capital of a kingdom that embraced the Euphrates Valley, Mesopotamia to the north, Syria, Palestine, northern Arabia, Idumea, and part of Egypt; a vast struggling dominion covering about 280,000 square miles. The River Euphrates flows out of the northern mountains through a deep bed between the cliffs of marl and gypsum, and thence into a country of hill and plain and rich pasture lands. Southward it enters the vast plains of Babylonia proper. The climate here is temperate and healthy, the country was in ancient times very prolific, providing great harvests of corn, and rich in palms. Many parts had springs of naphtha. The annual overflow was utilized

by extensive systems of irrigation, which were managed with the finest skill. Herodotus states that when finally this district of Babylonia was reduced to the rank of a Persian province, it yielded a revenue to the kings of Persia which comprised half their income. So rich and affluent was it that the prophets spoke of the mighty city itself as "Babylon, the glory of kingdoms: the beauty of the Chaldee excellency, the lady of kingdoms, given to pleasure; that dwelleth carelessly, and sayeth in her heart, I am, and there is none else beside me" (Isaiah Ch. 13, 14).

1. General Description. In order to defend the country against invasion on the north a wall, called the Median Wall, was built, running from the Tigris to the Euphrates. The people were themselves brave and warlike, their armies were enormous in size, vast hosts, but poorly disciplined, and made up, not only of native troops, but of contingents from the subject nations. They marched with vast noise and tumult, spreading themselves far and wide over the invaded country, plundering and destroying on every side. Sometimes they engaged in pitched battles, but generally these campaigns formed themselves into a series of sieges, the bulk of the people attacked retreating to the strong-walled cities, and so offering more or less extended resistance. Then when Jerusalem was besieged it held out some three years, and Tyre for fourteen years. The course of their great expeditions was frequently determined by divination. Priests accompanied the armies to superintend the sacrifices and interpret the omens, or in other words, declare from signs and accidental happenings, from stars and winds, from dreams and visions, the will of the gods. These priests and wise men were held in high honor. It was their business to guard

the Temple, to explain dreams, to read the meanings of the stars, to instruct men how to escape evils and troubles by certain sacrifices and religious duties. In the Book of Daniel we are told how the wise men failed to explain the strange writing on the wall and how Daniel was able to do this, and so was exalted to honor. The mass of the people in Babylonia were engaged in commerce and agriculture. The commerce was both foreign and domestic. The manufacture of carpets and muslins was extensive. The cutting and carving of precious stones was an important industry. Every Babylonian was adorned with these and had his own seal. Ordinary trades and handicrafts flourished-Babylonia was called a land of traffic (Ezek. 17:4), and Babylon a city of merchants (Isa. 43:14), both for trade on land and sea. From Arabia came frankincense; from Armenia, wine, gems, emery, building stone; from Phoenicia came tin, copper, musical instruments; from Media and the East came lapis-lazuli, a wonderful blue stone, silk and gold and ivory. Dates, one of the main articles of food, were produced in vast quantities, and grain was one of the most important products of the soil. The dates were dried and pressed into cakes, and, with goat's milk, made up the staple food of the poorer classes. Vegetables were also used, like gourds, melons, cucumbers. Besides these were wheaten bread, meats, fish and game and imported wines for richer people. Music was much cultivated. Bands or orchestras provided entertainment at all feasts, which were scenes of luxurious indulgence, with the rich fabrics, splendid dresses, exquisite carpets, rugs, and hangings, and the air laden with rare perfumes and the sounds of lute and viol and song. The worship of the Babylonians employed idols as the representations of

their gods. These images were made of wood, stone, or metal. Each shrine had at least one idol. The worship was conducted with great ceremonial and magnificence. The temple in Babylon was the most magnificent building in the city. It enclosed an area of some thirty acres or a space of 1,200 feet square. The central or most important feature was the great tower, rising in seven stages. At the summit was a shrine. The ascent to this was on the outside by means of an inclined plane or steps leading from one stage to the next. This tower was used both for religious purposes and also as a lookout. Here the astrologers, those who read the stars, and were the world's first astronomers, had their special place for observation of the heavens. The height of this temple is said to have been nearly 600 feet. Down below at the base of the tower, or somewhere within the temple enclosure, was a second shrine for those who could not climb to the upper shrine. Besides these were numerous altars placed about in the open air. The following description is of the temple at Birs-Nimrood near Babylon, the plan of which has been made out with a fair approach to certainty: "The ornamentation was chiefly in color. The seven stages represented the Seven Spheres, according to the old Chaldean Astronomy-thus the first stage, or Saturn, was black; the second, allotted to Jupiter, was orange; the third, of Mars, was colored blood-red by the half-burnt red bricks formed of a bright red clay; the fourth, representing the Sun, was covered with thin plates of gold; the fifth, the stage of Venus, was colored a pale yellow from bricks of that hue; the sixth, or stage of Mercury, was a brilliant blue, made from bricks burned to that color by intense heat; the seventh, or the Moon stage, was covered with

plates of silver. Thus the huge temple rose through its glowing rainbow tints until 'the glowing silvery summit melted into the bright sheen of the sky.'"-RAWLINSON.

Of the Palace of Babylon we have no way of knowing it in detail. It was of enormous extent, built upon a vast platform some fifty feet high, and so lifted far up from danger of attack, and above the low-flying insects of hot summer nights. Its material was brick laid in cement equal to the best Roman article. Color was profusely used: great mural paintings of war and the chase covered its interior walls. There is no evidence of any sculpture worth noting. The single figure, in the painting of a king, which we possess, is clumsy and ungraceful. It is chiefly remarkable for its elaborate head-dress, and the robes, which are very rich, but the proportions are bad, and the whole is extremely conventional, with probably no attempt at resemblance to the king it stands for. "It is probable that the most elaborate and most artistic of the Babylonian works of art were of a kind which has almost wholly perished." What painting is to us, color enamelling upon brick appears to have been to the people of Babylon. No attempt was made to blend colors into each other, thus producing the varying shades of which we moderns are so fond. But on the contrary the artist made use of simple tints, e.g., white, blue, yellow, brown, and black, sometimes red, and depended for his effect on the outline of his figures, their dress and ornamentation, and the careful arrangement of colors. Such painting as we have on the walls of our public buildings, like the Congressional Library or the Boston Library, they knew nothing of; and yet the walls of their palaces and temples must have been remarkably imposing, with a bold and barbaric sort of