[601] See Schrader in Riehm's _Handwörterbuch_, _s.vv._ "Sanherib," "Asarhaddon." Esarhaddon, judging from what is called "Sennacherib's will," in which the king leaves him splendid presents, seems to have been a favourite of his father (_Records of the Past_, i. 136). He says that on hearing of his father's murder, "I was wrathful as a lion, and my soul raged within me, and I lifted my hands to the great gods to assume the sovereignty of my father's house." See Appendix I.
[602] The Book of Tobit (i. 21) calls him Sarchedonas.
[606] Herod., ii. 14. "Sin" (Tanis?), Ezek. xxx. 15. It lay in the midst of morasses, and some attribute the catastrophe to the malaria.
[607] The deliverance is really connected with Tirhakah, whose deeds are recorded in a temple at Medinet Habou, but the jealousy of the Memphites attributed it to the piety of Sethos. See G. W. Wilkinson, _Ancient Egyptians_, i. 141; Rawlinson, _Herodotus_, i. 394.
[609] Comp. 1 Sam. v., vi., where, after a plague, the Philistines sent an expiation of five golden mice.
[610] We may add that even the Chronicler drops a veil over Sennacherib's actual capture of fortresses in Judah ("he _thought_ to win them for himself," 2 Chron. xxxii. 1: comp. 2 Kings xviii. 13; Isa. xxxvi. 1).
[614] Isa. viii., xxviii. 1-15, x. 28-34.
[617] Isa. x. 33, xxix. 5-8, xxx. 20-26, 30-33.
[618] Isa. xxxviii. 6. See for this paragraph an admirable chapter in Prof. Smith's _Isaiah_, pp. 368-374.
"Shall the throne of wickedness have fellowship with Thee, That frameth mischief by statute? They gather themselves in troops against the soul of the righteous, And condemn the innocent blood."--PSALM xciv. 20, 21.
"Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small; Though with patience long He waiteth, with exactness grinds He all."
Manasseh was born after Hezekiah's recovery from his terrible illness. He was but twelve years old when he began to reign. Of his mother Hephzibah we know nothing, nor of the Zechariah who was her father; but perhaps Isaiah in one passage (lxii. 4) may refer to her name, "My delight is in her."[624] The son of Hezekiah and Hephzibah was the worst of all the kings of Judah, and had the longest reign.
The tender age of Manasseh when he came to the throne may perhaps account for the fact that the "forgetfulness" which his name implied[625] was not a forgetting of other sorrows, but of all that was noble and righteous in the attempted reformation which had been the main religious work of his father's life. In Judah, as in England, a king was not supposed to be of age until he was eighteen.[626] For six years Manasseh must have been to a great extent under the influence of his regents and counsellors.