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The Aramean city Assyria crushed — invoked across Isaiah and Jeremiah as a warning to Jerusalem
Aram (Syria)Historically Verified
Identified with Tell Rifaat in modern northern Syria. Assyrian royal inscriptions from Tiglath-pileser III explicitly record the city's siege and fall in 740 BCE.
An ancient Aramean city in northern Syria, paired throughout the Old Testament with neighboring Hamath as a symbol of how completely Assyria's military machine could obliterate even the strongest Near Eastern kingdoms. The Assyrian king Sennacherib's field commander taunted King Hezekiah from outside Jerusalem's walls — "Where are the gods of Arpad? Have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?" (2 Kings 18:34; cf. 19:13). Isaiah picks up the same drumbeat (Isaiah 10:9; 36:19; 37:13), and Jeremiah names Arpad in his oracle against Damascus (Jeremiah 49:23). Arpad fell to Tiglath-pileser III in 740 BCE after a three-year siege.
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