Mesopotamia/Iraq : Land Between Rivers Up For Grabs

 Nadene Goldfoot           Ancient Mesopotamia                                        

Geographical distribution of the Sumerians, Akkadians, Babylonians, and Assyrians would primarily show the region of ancient Mesopotamia, specifically modern-day Iraq, and parts of neighboring countries like Syria and Iran. The map would typically highlight the areas where each civilization flourished and/or exerted influence. 

Mesopotamia's history saw rule by various groups and empires, including the Sumerians, Akkadians, Babylonians, Assyrians, and later, foreign powers like the Persians, Greeks, and Parthians. The region was also ruled by individual dynasties and city-states. 

Some of the important historical Mesopotamian leaders were Ur-Nammu (king of Ur), Sargon of Akkad (who established the Akkadian Empire), Hammurabi (who established the Old Babylonian state), Ashur-uballit I and Tiglath-Pileser I (who established the Assyrian Empire).

A map showing modern-day Iraq and parts of neighboring countries like Syria and Iran would display the political boundaries and geographical features of these areas. Iraq, located in West Asia, is bordered by Turkey to the north, Iran to the east, Syria and Jordan to the west, and Kuwait and Saudi Arabia to the south. The map would also likely include major cities like Baghdad, the capital of Iraq, as well as other key urban centers.                         

Babylon was a significant ancient city in southern Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq), serving as a major cultural and political center. It was located on the Euphrates River, near the modern town of Hillah, about 50 miles south of Baghdad. Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon (604-561 BCE) inherited the Assyrian Empire and thentook over the land of Judah in 597 and 586 BCE and exiled many Jews to Babylon. 

They were joined there by many of the other exiled Jews during the exile pulled byAssyria who rounded up the Jews of the northern 10 Tribes of Jacob who also woundup in Babylon.  Many remained in Babylon when all were freed anyway by Cyrus whosuggested they return to Jerusalem after this 50 year hiatus.  

During the Roman Occupation of Jerusalem, the Babylonian Jews rose against the emperor Trajan but it was supressed by Lucius Quietus in 116 BCE.  The Jews had been under Persian and Parthian rule but allowed a man chosen by the king ofDavid's descent to rule over them. 

Girsu, one of the earliest known cities in the history of humankind, was built by the ancient Sumerians, who between 3,500 and 2,000 BCE invented writing, built the first cities and created the first codes of law. The ancient city was first discovered 140 years ago, but the site has been the target of looting and illegal excavations.

• Iraq's economy is largely dependent on oil revenues, and the country faces challenges in diversifying its economy and improving its infrastructure.
• Infrastructural issues, such as gas explosions, continue to impact the country. 

3. Security Concerns:

• Iraq continues to face security challenges, including the threat of terrorist attacks and armed conflict. 
• The country is working to address the ongoing threat of ISIS and other terrorist groups. 
• There are also reports of attacks on US military bases and other installations in Iraq. 

4. Environmental Degradation and Climate Change:

• Iraq is highly vulnerable to climate change, facing issues like desertification, drought, and sandstorms.
• Environmental pollution and industrial emissions are also a concern. 

5. Social and Human Rights Issues:

• Iraq faces challenges related to human rights, including discrimination against women, LGBT individuals, and religious minorities.
• There are reports of government repression of protesters and arrests of journalists. 
• While the Iraqi government itself is not directly engaged in a state of war or attack against Israel, various Iran-backed militias within Iraq, collectively referred to as the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, have launched attacks against Israel. 
  
         Iran was blamed for Iraq's acquisition of arms, missiles and drones.  
• 
  
• After October 7, 2023, we see: By November 2023, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq began military operations against Israel, targeting Eilat, the Dead Sea coastline, the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, the Karish gas field, Haifa, Ashdod, Kiryat Shmona, Tel Aviv and in Elifelet with drones and missiles.
• Resource:
• https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/05/14/iraq-new-government-new-legislative-agenda?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=16363698676&gbraid=0AAAAADrFXcj9m_BN9c_4dSZIHSMT7Rk0p&gclid=CjwKCAjwl_XBBhAUEiwAWK2hzq2PvjbAVjITa7zNvW6nCpIZIxZBcAUT-Ypjb3U7D3QHfn7sQ4lG8xoC2FYQAvD_BwE

KIDNAPPED Seventy Years Ago

 Nadene Goldfoot                                        

Wasn't he lucky, though?  Nebuchadnezzar II (604-561 BCE) inherited a whole empire because of his victory!    He was the Babylonian king that came to own Assyria's Empire. He had won the battle over the Assyrian-Egyptian alliance at Carchemish in 605.  He was now the Emperor as he conquered all the lands from the Euphrates River to the Egyptian frontier, including Judah. 

 His  conquest achievement was in taking the land of Judah in 597 BCE and again in his last attack in 586 BCE, 11 years later.  He succeeded in exiling many of its Jews to Babylon. Many scholars cite 597 BCE as the date of the first deportation, for in that year King Jehoiachin was deposed and apparently sent into exile with his family, his court, and thousands of workers.

 Others say the first deportation followed the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadrezzar in 586 BCE; if so, the Jews were held in Babylonian captivity for 48 years.

They joined up with a population of 27,290  Hebrews that had been exiled by Assyria in 721 BCE., but that that was a good 135 years earlier. As far as they were concerned, they were simply taking back their own people who had once strayed away during some bad times.

 Among those who accept a tradition (Jeremiah 29:10) that the exile lasted 70 years, some choose the dates 608 to 538, others 586 to about 516 (the year when the rebuilt Temple was dedicated in Jerusalem).  This one is most popular.  They were kidnapped 70 years ago from their home in Judah!  Now they are faced with a choice of staying or returning to their ancestral homeland!  Most of them had never lived there, being born in Babylonia.  

Here's how it all came about:  

Ur, modern Tall al-Muqayyar or Tell el-Muqayyar, Iraq, important city of ancient southern Mesopotamia (Sumer), situated about 140 miles (225 km) southeast of the site of Babylon and about 10 miles (16 km) west of the present bed of the Euphrates River.  As an absolute minimal then, Abram, Sarai, Lot and all their herds, livestock, servants, etc must have walked 1551 miles (2494 Km) and it was probably MUCH more than that!

    Was this group Jacob's family-and were they Hyksos people?  

It was Terah with his son, Abraham and wife Sarah who had left long ago, possibly with a group later called the Hyksos, though they called themselves Habiru (Hebrew) and that Haran, their stopover, was a Habiru town,  in about 1500 BCE, who emigrated and created  Haran, that became a trading town,  and lived there for quite a while, then continued onto Egypt. Haran was Abram's brother who also lived in Ur of the Chaldees (Gen 11:26-31) and established Haran. They already had a moon cult established there.    But then that was a very long long time ago 903 years earlier than the days of Nebuchadnezzar.  Only Egypt would remember such migrations.

                         Pharaoh  Ahmose of Egypt

 The new king of Egypt, Kamose, the last king of the 17th dynasty, ruled over Egypt only for 5 years. However, in this short period, he was able to defeat the Hyksos until he reached their capital in the Delta. Kamose also took control of many other regions in Egypt including Al Bahariya Oasis and the Nubia. After his death, his brother, Ahmose, became the king of Egypt. Ahmose was in fact only 10 years old when he became the ruler of Egypt. Ahmose’s mother encouraged and motivated him to train on fighting. When he was 19 years old, his men were able to find a letter written from the King of the Hyksos to the rulers of Nubia to begin moving towards Thebes and attack it. This motivated Ahmose to begin a huge military campaign against the Hyksos.

     Babylon, known for its hanging gardens...

  All return to Babylon, thought Abram, as his name had been, and was from Ur of the Chaldees tribes.  They had moved into Ur with the natives already living there.  

By 538 BCE, some Jews had returned to Jerusalem after this 70 year hiatus. This means that only the oldest of the lot had been there as wee children, while the rest had never seen it or lived there earlier.  They were taking quite a chance as they had no idea what conditions they would find, and here they were in Babylon, all comfortable and cozy.   Babylon was the city of civilization, such as it was, in those days.  It was developed, organized and said to be beautiful, and probably was, but compared to what?  

The earliest Jews were in Rome was in 139 BCE. The traditional date for the founding of Rome is April 21st, 753 BC. Capitoline Wolf suckles the infant twins Romulus and Remus. The traditional date for the founding of the greatest city of the Western world was the product of guesswork by Roman writers of the late centuries BC, working backwards from their own time.  Jews had wound up in Rome that early from the close relationship Judea had with Rome from some trading, intermittent wars, and  Jewish slaves in Rome.                                    

        Ancient Babylon or Shinar in Bible, ziggurat in background...with Babylonia also referred to as land of the Kasdim (Chaldees)...meaning people of Abraham's line from Ur, no doubt..

 It was Cyrus II, king of Persia, who had granted permission to the exiles of Judah living in Babylon to return to their homeland and rebuild the Temple. (Ezra 1:1-44);  (II Chron.36:22-23) The Jewish exiles in return regarded Cyrus as a Divine agent. (Is 44:28:45:1). He had delivered an enlightened policy towards his subject people by allowing them to return home if so desired.  

When in Babylon, they maintained their national spirit and religious identity. Elders supervised the Jewish communities, and Ezekiel was one of several prophets who kept alive the hope of one day returning home. This was possibly also the period when synagogues were first established, for the Jews observed the Sabbath and religious holidays, practiced circumcision, and substituted prayers for former ritual sacrifices in the Temple. The degree to which the Jews looked upon Cyrus the Great as their benefactor and a servant of their God is reflected at several points in the Hebrew Bible—e.g., at Isaiah 45:1–3, where he is actually called God’s anointed. 

In the story of Esther, Cyrus is also inferred to be Esther's son or grandson.  Esther had married King Ahasuerus according to the Megillat Esther, though his name, Ahasuerus is not found in Persian records, written before 330 BCE, so that must be the Habiru name.  

The kings of the older line were Cyrus I, Cambyses I, Cyrus II (the Great), and Cambyses II. After the death of Cambyses II (522 bce) the junior line came to the throne with Darius I. The dynasty became extinct with the death of Darius III, following his defeat (330 bce) by Alexander the Great. Darius I reigned from 522-486 BCE and had inherited the throne of Cyrus.  At the beginning of his reign, he permitted Prince Zerubbabel and the Jews who had returned to Jerusalem to resume reconstruction of the Temple.  

Zerubbabel displays a plan of Jerusalem to Cyrus the Great by Jacob van Loo.

Zerubbabel (480 BCE) was the grandson of King Jehoiachin (598-597 BCE) of Judah, son of King Jehoiakim of Judah.  He sat on the throne at age 18 during the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem and reigned for only 3 months and 10 days before capitulating to Nebuchadnezzar.  then he was taken to exile in Babylonia, remaining in detention until the accession of Evil-Merodach in 561 BCE when he was released (II Kings 24-25) (II Chron.. 36:8-10).  Official Babylonian records relating to his captivity have been recovered.  

      The rebuilding of the Temple of Solomon-2nd Temple

About 60 years after Zerubbabel had led his people back to Jerusalem from Babylonia, Ezra,  a Cohen, of the priestly family of Zadok who was working as a scribe in Babylon for the Persian government,  heard terrible reports about the returned Jews in Jerusalem in that they had lost the spirit of Judaism.  So he decided to lead another party back to Jerusalem who would firmly establish the Mosaic law.                                                

                                                   

In 458 BCE he received the permission from Artaxerxes I of Persia (could this be Ahasueros?)  and went to Jerusalem with 1,754 returning exiles.  Ezra together with Nehemiah, cupbearer to King Artaxerxes,  who became governor of Judah, persuaded the people to 1. keep the Torah, 2. to observe the Sabbath and the 3. sabbatical year, to 4. pay their Temple dues, and to 5. reject intermarriage with gentiles by 444 BCE. It was King Artaxerxes who appointed Nehemiah governor over Judah in 444 BCE.                                       

Nehemiah had organized the builders, the repair of its walls--an activity that was completed in 52 days despite interference by neighboring peoples.  He then devoted himself to social reforms with Ezra.   including cancellation of debts owed by the poor.  the leaders of the people had to pledge themselves to maintain the Temple regulations and pay their tithes.   

The security of Jerusalem was ensured by arranging for 1/10th of the people to live there.  After 12 years, Nehemiah returned to Susa, Persia but later returned to Jerusalem to renew his position.  In 433-432 BCE he took steps against mixed marriages, in conjunction with Ezra.  His work was decisive in the rebuilding of Judah.  Nehemiah's memoirs form the basis of the biblical Book of Nehemiah-which is a continuation of the Book of Ezra in the Hagiographa.  

Iraqi Jew kissing Mezuzah holding Deut.6:4-9 and 11:13-21 of parchment scroll beside the door on the right side, custom of all Jews everywhere.  The purpose is to remind us that all man's material possessions are the gift of heaven.  

The estimated 80,000 Jews who remained in Babylon – Iraq – after the return to Zion formed what was to become one of the most ancient exile communities in the world, existing for some 2,500 years continuously until 1948.  As for the male line of  Iraqi Jewry, I see a lot of E's, J1 (Cohen gene) and Gs listed at FTDNA.  

Resource:

https://www.familytreedna.com/public/AramaicDNAProject?iframe=yresults  chart of Y dna line

The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia

https://www.britannica.com/event/Babylonian-Captivity

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zerubbabel

https://www.biblecartoons.co.uk/maps/map-of-middle-east-abram-abraham-s-journey-from-ur-to-canaan-distance in miles

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahmose_I

The City of UR, Abraham's Home Town and Elam, the Enemy

 Nadene Goldfoot                                         

The man who started us in monotheism was Abram, later called Abraham after certain events had happened to him-showing the change.  He was born in Ur in about 1948 BCE, a bustling city on the Euphrates River in today's Iraq. He was the son of Terah, an idol-maker, who had a thriving business.

  Known as an important city of ancient southern Mesopotamia (Sumer) and its ziggurat.  

Ur was in lower Mesopotamia, the Sumer of the ancient world.  It was really the river-valley of the Tigris and the Euphrates Rivers.  It lies about half-way between Bagdad and the head of the Gulf, about 10 miles west  of the present course of the Euphrates River.  Ur is in ruins, now, of course.  1 and1/2 miles to the east is a line of railway which joins Basra to the capital of Iraq. Basra is an Iraqi city located on the Shatt al-Arab. It had an estimated population of 1.4 million in 2018. Basra is also Iraq's main port, although it does not have deep water access, which is handled at the port of Umm Qasr. The city is one of the ports from which the fictional Sinbad the Sailor journeyed.

Human sacrifice occurred in these days.  Abram was going to sacrifice his son, Isaac, but learned that this was not to happen by being stopped by G-d.  The belief in human sacrifice continued long into Israel's history by women the Israelites took as foreign wives; beautiful but dangerous to their society.

Hanging Gardens of Babylon:  land of Shinar or of the Kasdim (Chaldees); cradle of humanity, 1st revolt against G-d with Tower of Babel,, the flood, where Ur was in the Chaldees.  Babylonia was in Mesopotamia and is another name for Iraq. Abraham, born in Ur, migrated to Canaan where he later fought Amraphel, king of Shinar (Gen.14).  

The Babylonian Nebuchadnezzar II (604 BCE inherited the Assyrian Empire and after his conquest of Judah in 597 BCE and again in 586 BCE, exiled many Jews to Babylon.  Members of the 10 Tribes of Jacob, taken by the Assyrians in 721 BCE, were probably still living there and now were united with this new group of Jewish captives.  The Babylonian Talmud was written here by former captives that was an outstanding work.                                                  

Ur on Euphrates and later on, Baghdad developed on Tigris

 Located along the Tigris River and at the junction of historic trade roads, Baghdad is the capital of Iraq and the country's largest city being home to more than 7.6 million inhabitants. Had large Jewish community by 763 CE.  It had originally been a Persian village called Baghdad, and was selected by al-Manṣūr, the second caliph of the Abbasid dynasty, for his capital.

                                    The ruins of Eridu
 The people of Sumer's most ancient city was Eridu, which lie 11 miles south of Ur. Eridu has been excavated by the  Iraqi government in 1947-1949.  Eridu was revered as the oldest city in Sumer according to the king lists, and its patron god was Enki (Ea), “lord of the sweet waters that flow under the earth.” The site, located at a mound called Abū Shahrayn, was excavated principally between 1946 and 1949 by the Iraq Antiquities Department; it proved to be one of  the most important of the prehistoric urban centres in southern Babylonia.                      

                           city of Basrah

In 1854, Mr. Joe E. Taylor of the British Consul at Basra was hired by the British Museum  to check out sites of southern Mesopotamia so he first tackled the MOUND OF PITCH (Bitumen).  He unearthed inscriptions that revealed that this nameless ruin was the site of the ancient UR, mentioned  in the Torah.  After 2 seasons, this site was closed down.  Evidently the museum found it too dangerous a place to work in, and wanted to get back there.  

Harry Reginald Holland Hall born in 1873 or Dr. Hall died unexpectedly on 13 October, 1930 in prime of life at 57.  At age 16, he wrote a history on ancient Persia.  

The first serious excavations at Ur were made after World War I by H.R. Hall of the British Museum, and as a result a joint expedition was formed by the British Museum and the University of Pennsylvania that carried on the excavations under Leonard Woolley’s directorship from 1922 until 1934. Almost every period of the city’s lifetime has been illustrated by the discoveries, and knowledge of Mesopotamian history has been greatly enlarged.

It was found that the shoreline may have run  from 80 to 175 miles northwest of its present line.  Ancient texts were found to mention Eridu and Ur "on the sea," which could have been quite true. 

Sir Leonard Woolley was the main archaeologist of Ur.  He was the son of a clergyman  and when young thought of going into the church himself as a profession, and was probably the main reason why he was so interested in Ur.   He wrote many books with this in mind.  By 1914 (when my mother was born)  reviewers were negative about his biblical references, saying they were inappropriate.  So by 1936, Woolley wrote a whole book called ABRAHAM, to UR and the  patriarchal narratives.  As a Christian, he opened the door of vetting the truth about Ur in the Torah.

Woolley mentioned a bowl they found, carved with a demon and animal figures, in a style possibly by Elamites or others in SW Iran. The  temples in Ur were held in highest regard by kings of the Akkadian dynasty.  A copy was made by a later scribe recorded the inscription on the base of a statue set up by manishtushu, Rimush's successor, at Ur and dedicated to the god Enlil.  Even the last great king of the dynasty, Naram-Sin, is only evidenced at UR by similar later copies of statue inscriptions, and by vessel and mace-head fragments bearing his name.  

                              This copyright was in 1954.  
His UR of the Chaldees was done in 1982.

                                    King Sargon I

What was found:  In the next (Early Dynastic) period(29th-24th centuries) Ur became the capital of the whole of southern Mesopotamia under the Sumerian kings of the 1st dynasty of Ur (25th century BCE). Excavation of a vast cemetery from the period preceding that dynasty (26th century) produced royal tombs containing almost incredible treasures in gold, silver, bronze, and semiprecious stones, showing not only the wealth of the people of Ur but also their highly developed civilization and art. Not the least remarkable discovery was that of the custom whereby kings were buried along with a whole retinue of their court officials, servants, and women, privileged to continue their service in the next world. Musical instruments from the royal tombs, golden weapons, engraved shell plaques and mosaic pictures, statuary and carved cylinder seals, all are a collection of unique importance, illustrating a civilization previously unknown to the historian. 

A few personal inscriptions confirmed the real existence of the almost legendary ruler Sargon I, king of Akkad, who reigned in the 24th century BCE, and a cemetery illustrated the material culture of his time.

From the 22nd century, To the next period, that of the 3rd dynasty of Ur, when Ur was again the capital of an empire, belong some of the most important architectural monuments preserved on the site. Foremost among these is the ziggurat, a three-storied solid mass of mud brick faced with burnt bricks set in bitumen, rather like a stepped pyramid; on its summit was a small shrine, the bedchamber of the moon god Nanna (Sin), the patron deity and divine king of Ur. The lowest stage measures at its foot some 210 by 150 feet (64 by 46 metres), and its height was about 40 feet. On three sides the walls, relieved by shallow buttresses, rose sheer. On the northeast face were three great staircases, each of 100 steps, one projecting at right angles from the centre of the building, two leaning against its wall, and all three converging in a gateway between the first and the second terrace. From this a single flight of steps led upward to the top terrace and to the door of the god’s little shrine. The lower part of the ziggurat, built by Ur-Nammu, the founder of the dynasty, was astonishingly well preserved; enough of the upper part survived to make the restoration certain.

From the 21st to 6th century:  Elamite states were among the leading political forces of the Ancient Near East. In classical literature, Elam was also known as Susiana , a name derived from its capital Susa, actually in Iran. 

Susa, now an UNESCO World Heritage Center located in the south-west of Iran, in the lower Zagros Mountains, the property encompasses a group of archaeological mounds rising on the eastern side of the Shavur River, as well as Ardeshir’s palace, on the opposite bank of the river.
 The emergence of written records from around 3000 BCE also parallels Sumerian history, where slightly earlier records have been found. In the Old Elamite period (Middle Bronze Age), Elam consisted of kingdoms on the Iranian plateau, centered in Anshan, and from the mid-2nd millennium BCE, it was centered in Susa in the Khuzestan lowlands. Its culture played a crucial role during the Persian Achaemenid dynasty that succeeded Elam, when the Elamite language remained among those in official use. Elamite is generally considered a language isolate unrelated to any other languages. In accordance with geographical and archaeological matches, some historians argue that the Elamites comprise a large portion of the ancestors of the modern day Lurs whose language, Luri, split from Middle Persian.

The great brick mausoleums of the 3rd-dynasty kings and the temples they built were sacked and destroyed by the Elamites, but the temples at least were restored by the kings of the succeeding dynasties of Isin and Larsa, and, though it ceased to be the capital, Ur retained its religious and commercial importance. Having access by river and canal to the Persian Gulf, it was the natural headquarters of foreign trade. 

As early as the reign of Sargon of Akkad, it had been in touch with India, at least indirectly. Personal seals of the Indus valley type from the 3rd dynasty and the Larsa period have been found at Ur, while many hundreds of clay tablets show how the foreign trade was organized. The “sea kings” of Ur carried goods for export to the entrepôt at Dilmun (Bahrain) and there picked up the copper and ivory that came from the east.

Sumerians believed in anthropomorphic polytheism, or of many gods in human form, which were specific to each city-state. The core pantheon consisted of An (heaven), Enki (a healer and friend to humans), Enlil (gave spells spirits must obey), Inanna (love and war), Utu (sun-god), and Sin (moon-god).

Abram left all this as the people were idol worshippers and he wanted his future descendants to believe in ONE G-d as he now did.  

Resource:

Book:  UR "of the Chaldees" updated Edition of Sir Leonard Woolley's Excavations at UR, by PRS Mooney

The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia

https://www.britannica.com/place/Ur

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eridu

https://www.britannica.com/place/Eridu

https://www.britannica.com/place/Baghdad/History

https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1455/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elam#:~:text=Elamite%20states%20were%20among%20the,derived%20from%20its%20capital%20Susa.