Kingdom of Judah 𐤉𐤄𐤃 | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
c. 930 BCE[1]–c. 587 BCE | |||||||
LMLK seal (700–586 BCE)
| |||||||
![]() The kingdoms of Judah and Israel c. 830 BCE | |||||||
Status | Kingdom | ||||||
Capital | Jerusalem | ||||||
Common languages | Biblical Hebrew | ||||||
Religion |
| ||||||
Demonym(s) | Judahite, Judean | ||||||
Government | Monarchy | ||||||
King | |||||||
• c. 931–913 BCE | Rehoboam (first) | ||||||
• c. 597–587 BCE | Zedekiah (last) | ||||||
Historical era | Iron Age | ||||||
c. 930 BCE[1] | |||||||
c. 587 BCE | |||||||
|
The Kingdom of Judah[a] was an Israelite kingdom of the Southern Levant during the Iron Age. Centered in the highlands of Judea, the kingdom's capital was Jerusalem.[3]
The Hebrew Bible depicts the Kingdom of Judah as one of the two successor states of the United Kingdom of Israel, a term denoting the united monarchy under biblical kings Saul, David, and Solomon and covering the territory of Judah and Israel. However, during the 1980s, some biblical scholars began to argue that the archaeological evidence for an extensive kingdom before the late 8th century BCE is too weak, and that the methodology used to obtain the evidence is flawed.[4][5] In the 10th and early 9th centuries BCE, the territory of Judah appears to have been sparsely populated, limited to small rural settlements, most of them unfortified.[6] The Tel Dan Stele, discovered in 1993, shows that the kingdom existed in some form by the middle of the 9th century BCE,[7][8][9] but it does not indicate the extent of its power. Recent excavations at Khirbet Qeiyafa, however, support the existence of a centrally organized and urbanized kingdom by the 10th century BCE, according to the excavators.[4][10]
In the 7th century BCE, the kingdom's population increased greatly, prospering under Neo-Assyrian vassalage, despite Hezekiah's revolt against the Assyrian king Sennacherib.[11] Josiah took advantage of the political vacuum that resulted from Assyria's decline and the emergence of Saite Egyptian rule over the area to enact his religious reforms. The Deuteronomistic history, which recounts the history of the people of Israel from Joshua to Josiah and expresses a worldview based on the legal principles found in the Book of Deuteronomy, is assumed to have been written during this same time period and emphasizes the significance of upholding them.[12]
With the final fall of the Neo-Assyrian Empire in 605 BCE, competition emerged between Saite Egypt and the Neo-Babylonian Empire over control of the Levant, ultimately resulting in Judah's rapid decline. The early 6th century BCE saw a wave of Egyptian-backed Judahite rebellions against Babylonian rule being crushed. In 587 BCE, Nebuchadnezzar II engaged in a siege of Jerusalem, ultimately destroying the city and ending the kingdom.[13][12] A large number of Judeans were exiled to Babylon, and the fallen kingdom was then annexed as a Babylonian province.[12]
After the fall of Babylon to the Achaemenid Empire, the Achaemenid king Cyrus the Great allowed the Jews who had been deported after the conquest of Judah to return. They were allowed to autonomous rule under Persian governance. It was not until 400 years later, following the Maccabean Revolt, that Judeans fully regained independence.
The Tel Dan inscription generated a good deal of debate and a flurry of articles when it first appeared, but it is now widely regarded (a) as genuine and (b) as referring to the Davidic dynasty and the Aramaic kingdom of Damascus.
Today, after much further discussion in academic journals, it is accepted by most archaeologists that the inscription is not only genuine but that the reference is indeed to the House of David, thus representing the first allusion found anywhere outside the Bible to the biblical David.
Some unfounded accusations of forgery have had little or no effect on the scholarly acceptance of this inscription as genuine.
Sargon's heir, Sennacherib (705–681), could not deal with Hezekiah's revolt until he gained control of Babylon in 702 BCE.
Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha>
tags or {{efn}}
templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}}
template or {{notelist}}
template (see the help page).