CHAPTER XXI

KING HOSHEA AND THE FALL OF THE NORTHERN KINGDOM (B.C. 734-725) 235

The name Hoshea--The king and the prophet--Occasional gleams of hope and promise--A humiliating reign--Death of Tiglath-Pileser--Hoshea revolts to Sabaco of Egypt--Seized by Shalmaneser--Samaria besieged--Terrible state of the city--Sabaco renders no help--Usurpation of Sargon--Capture of the city--Greatness of Sargon--Fall of the Northern Kingdom--Blighted destiny--God's mercy--"God, and not man"--Despoliation of the tribes--Moral of the story--Assyria and Egypt--The strength and weakness of a nation--Machiavelli--Mixture of alien emigrants--Their worship--The lions--Strange syncretism--The Jews and the Samaritans.

THE REIGN OF AHAZ (B.C. 735-715) 260

The chronology--A distracted kingdom--Dark pictures from Isaiah--No sign of repentance--Grapes and wild grapes.