Assyrian captivity

The Assyrian captivity, also called the Assyrian exile, is the period in the history of ancient Israel and Judah during which tens of thousands of Israelites from the Kingdom of Israel were dispossessed and forcibly relocated by the Neo-Assyrian Empire. One of many instances attesting Assyrian resettlement policy, this mass deportation of the Israelite nation began immediately after the Assyrian conquest of Israel, which was overseen by the Assyrian kings Tiglath-Pileser III and Shalmaneser V. The later Assyrian kings Sargon II and Sennacherib also managed to subjugate the Israelites in the neighbouring Kingdom of Judah following the Assyrian siege of Jerusalem in 701 BC, but were unable to annex their territory outright. The Assyrian captivity's victims are known as the Ten Lost Tribes, and Judah was left as the sole Israelite kingdom until the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem in 587 BC, which resulted in the Babylonian captivity of the Jewish people. Not all of Israel's populace was deported by the Assyrians; some of those who were not expelled from the former kingdom's territory eventually became known as the Samaritan people.

Biblical account

The captivities began in approximately 732 BC according to modern scholarship.

In 722 BC, around ten years after the initial deportations, the ruling city of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, Samaria, was finally taken by Sargon II after a three-year siege started by Shalmaneser V.

The term "cities of the Medes" mentioned above may be a corruption from an original text "Mountains of Media".

Many Israelite civilians were killed during the invasion, with infants being dashed and pregnant women being ripped open (Hosea 13:16). Similar acts were perpetrated in later Assyrian conquests, such as their conquest of Elam.

According to 2nd Chronicles, Chapter 30, there is evidence that at least some people of the Northern Kingdom of Israel were not exiled. These were invited by king Hezekiah to keep the Passover in a feast at Jerusalem with the Judean population. (The holiday was set one month forward from its original date.) Hezekiah sent his posts to spread the word among the remnant of the Northern kingdom; the posts were mocked during their visit to the country of Ephraim, Manasseh and Zebulun. However, some people of Asher and Manasseh and of Zebulun humbled themselves and came to Jerusalem. In a later part of the chapter, even people from the Tribe of Issachar and the strangers that "came out from the land of Israel" were said to take part in the passover event. Biblical scholars such as Umberto Cassuto and Elia Samuele Artom claimed that Hezekiah might have annexed these territories, in which inhabitants of the Kingdom of Israel remained, into his own kingdom.

In 2nd Chronicles, Chapter 31, it is said that the remnant of the Kingdom of Israel returned to their homes, but not before destroying Ba'al and Ashera places of Idol worship left in "all Judah and Benjamin, in Ephraim also and Manasseh".

Assyrian cuneiform

The Babylonian Chronicle ABC1 records that Shalmaneser V conquered Samaria, as stated in the Bible. Likewise, Assyrian cuneiform states that 27,290 captives were taken from Samaria, the capital of the new Assyrian province of Samerina, by Sargon II.

Sargon records his first campaign on the walls of the royal palace at Dur-Sharrukin (Khorsabad):

The description of the final defeat of the Northern Kingdom of Israel above appears to be a minor event in Sargon's legacy. Some historians attribute the ease of Israel's defeat to the previous two decades of invasions, defeats, and deportations.

Some estimates assume a captivity numbering in the hundreds of thousands, minus those who died in defense of the kingdom and minus those who fled voluntarily before and during the invasions. It has also been suggested that the numbers deported by the Assyrians were rather limited and the bulk of the population remained in situ. There is also evidence that significant numbers fled south to the Kingdom of Judah. Archaeologically speaking, it is known that the invasion was accompanied by large-scale destruction and abandonment at many sites. There are also some cuneiform texts that document the presence of Israelites in Assyria after the deportations.

Modern scholarship

Contemporary scholarship confirms that deportations occurred both before and after the Assyrian conquest of the Kingdom of Israel in 722–720 BCE, with varying impacts across Galilee, Transjordan, and Samaria. During the earlier Assyrian invasions, Galilee and Transjordan experienced significant deportations, with entire tribes vanishing; the tribes of Reuben, Gad, Dan, and Naphtali are never again mentioned. Archaeological evidence from these regions shows that a large depopulation process took place there in the late 8th century BCE, with numerous sites being destroyed, abandoned, or feature a long occupation gap. In contrast, archaeological findings from Samaria—a larger and more populated area—suggest a more mixed picture. While some sites were destroyed or abandoned during the Assyrian invasion, major cities such as Samaria and Megiddo remained largely intact, and other sites show a continuity of occupation. The Assyrians settled exiles from Babylonia, Elam, and Syria in places including Gezer, Hadid, and villages north of Shechem and Tirzah. However, even if the Assyrians deported 30,000 people, as they claimed, many would have remained in the area. Based on changes in material culture, Adam Zertal estimated that only 10% of the Israelite population in Samaria was deported, while the number of imported settlers was likely no more than a few thousand, indicating that most Israelites continued to reside in Samaria.

Archaeologist Eric Cline believes only 10–20% of Samaria’s Israelite population (i.e. 40,000 Israelites) were deported to Assyria in 720 BCE. About 80,000 Israelites fled to Judah whilst between 100,000 and 230,000 Israelites remained in Samaria. The latter intermarried with the foreign settlers, thus forming the Samaritans.

Return

Unlike the Kingdom of Judah, which was allowed to return from its Babylonian captivity, the ten tribes of the Northern Kingdom never had a foreign edict granting permission to return and rebuild their homeland. Many centuries later, rabbis of the restored Kingdom of Judah were still debating the return of the lost ten tribes.

According to the Books of Chronicles chapter 9 verse 3, the Israelites, who took part in the Return to Zion, are stated to be from the Tribe of Judah alongside the Tribe of Simeon that was absorbed into it, the Tribe of Benjamin, the Tribe of Levi (Levites and Priests) alongside the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh, which according to the Book of Kings 2 Chapter 17 were exiled by the Assyrians (the Biblical scholars Umberto Cassuto and Elia Samuele Artom claimed these two tribes' names to be a reference to the remnant of all Ten Tribes that was not exiled and absorbed into the Judean population).

Nonetheless, Nehemiah chapter 11 verse 3 describes a group called "Israel" settling in Judean neighborhoods. This "Israel" was composed of various Israelite tribes, who intermarried with each other. In contrast, the Israelite tribes of Judah and Benjamin settled in Jerusalem.

References

Sources

Knoppers, Gary N. (2013). Jews and Samaritans: The Origins and History of Their Early Relations. OUP USA. ISBN 978-0-195-32954-4.
Tobolowsky, Andrew (2022). "The Tribes That Were Not Lost: The Samaritans". The Myth of the Twelve Tribes of Israel: New Identities Across Time and Space. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 69–70, 73–75. doi:10.1017/9781009091435.003. ISBN 978-1-316-51494-8.