King Jareb and Nineveh

By Eduardo Martínez-Rancaño, 2012

Speaking of the calf-idol at Bethel,¹ Hosea 10:6 states:

It shall be also carried unto Assyria for a present to king Jareb: Ephraim shall receive shame, and Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel. (KJV)

A modern translation, such as the NIV, states it this way:

It will be carried to Assyria as tribute for the great king. Ephraim will be disgraced; Israel will be ashamed of its wooden idols.

Apart from the clarification as to what "his own counsel" really meant, it is to be noted that instead of the unknown "King Jareb" of Assyria, the Hebrew lemelek yareb has been regrouped as lemalky rab, which renders the protocolary title "my great king" (sharru rabu in Assyrian) very nicely. The same thing happens in Hosea 5:13. So, the best available evidence today is that Hosea 5:13 and 10:6 present a royal title without a specific reference to a king by name.

Now, if we turn to Mrs. White's writings we find the following:

The ten tribes of Israel were not to reap the fruitage of the apostasy that had taken form with the setting up of the strange altars at Bethel and at Dan. God's message to them was: 'Thy calf, O Samaria, hath cast thee off; Mine anger is kindled against them: how long will it be ere they attain to innocency? For from Israel was it also: the workman made it; therefore it is not God: but the calf of Samaria shall be broken in pieces.' 'The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear because of the calves of Beth-aven: for the people thereof shall mourn over it, and the priests thereof that rejoiced on it. . . . It shall be also carried unto Assyria for a present to King Jareb' (Sennacherib). Hosea 8:5, 6; 10:5, 6.²

In this passage Mrs. White identifies King Jareb as Sennacherib. Mrs. White went out of her way to identify the unnamed king vaguely alluded to by Hosea as "the great king". How inspired was she in her choice? Well, considering that Israel ceased to exist, at the very latest, early in the reign of Sargon II, who happened to be Sennacherib's father, it would appear she was mistaken. In Hosea 5:13, it says Israel would ask for the great king's help. Applying this to Sennacherib is nonsensical. Israel did not even exist during his reign!

There are significant pointers in Hosea 5:13 that involve dating this request several decades earlier than Mrs White's identification would allow.³ It does not take a prophet to know these things. Although some knowledge of ancient history does help, just reading the Bible should be enough not to be confused by the false revelation that Sennacherib was King Jareb.

When was Nineveh Assyria's Capital?

Another Assyrian mistake by Mrs White is found in the following paragraph:

Among the cities of the ancient world, one of the greatest was Nineveh, on the fertile bank of the Tigris, over two hundred miles to the northward of Babylon. Founded about the time of the dispersion from the tower of Babel, it had become 'an exceeding great city of three days' journey.' Jonah 3:3. In the days of divided Israel it was the capital of the Assyrian realm.⁴

By "divided Israel" Mrs White must have meant the time from Jeroboam's schism, after Solomon's death, until the downfall of Samaria after Hoshea, the last king of Israel. The commonly accepted dates for these events are 931 BC and 722 BC, respectively, a period that lasted just over two centuries. Undoubtedly, throughout this period, Nineveh was an important city of the Assyrian kingdom. The question, however, is how accurate is Mrs White's assessment that in this period Nineveh "was the capital of the Assyrian realm"?

The Assyrian kings involved in this time frame, and their capital cities were as follows: