Witness first-hand the terror of the Assyrian army invading Judah in the time of King Hezekiah
Visiting the British Museum enables us to get up close to the reality of what people experienced in Bible times.
The Lachish reliefs are a classic example. They relate to the time when the Assyrian King Sennacherib invaded Judah in 701 BC, an event which is described extensively in Isaiah 36-37, 1 Kings 18-19 and 2 Chronicles 32. His aim was to take Jerusalem, but when Sennacherib returned to Nineveh to commemorate his campaign on the walls of his palace, it was not the capture of Jerusalem that was illustrated, but the taking of Lachish, the second most important city in Judah.
Aside from this extra-biblical testimony to God's deliverance of Hezekiah and the city of Jerusalem, what is astonishing about the Lachish reliefs is that we can witness the terrifying nature of the Assyrian war machine that Hezekiah was faced with first-hand. As we scan the images, we learn about Assyrian military tactics involving ancient siege weapons, the desperate attempts of the defenders to repel them and the ghastly fate of captured leaders of the town, who are gruesomely tortured and executed. We witness the sad departure of Judean families, loading up their carts to head off into exile, the only depiction anywhere in the world of Judeans at this point in time.
These images help us to appreciate Hezekiah's trust in the Lord at a time of such extreme crisis and encourage us to imitate his faith.
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