She is pillaged, plundered, stripped! Hearts melt, knees give way, bodies tremble, every face grows pale. – Nahum 2:10

Today’s Scripture Reading (March 17, 2020): Nahum 2

Aesop tells the story of “Four Oxen and a Lion.” Once upon a time there were four oxen who shared a field together. There was also a lion in the vicinity, but he was never able to defeat the four oxen. The problem was that every time the lion came near, the oxen pressed their tails together, showing only their sharp horns to their enemy. It didn’t matter which direction the lion chose for his attack; it was always the horns of the oxen that greeted him. The task of getting to the four oxen was hopeless, and so, eventually, the lion gave up.

Without an enemy always pursuing them, the minds of the oxen drifted off to other things. They began to be critical of each other, and they complained about almost every aspect of their life and relationship together until, one day, they decided that they had had enough. There were lots of pastures available in the area, they didn’t have to share the same one. And so the four oxen decided to separate, each one finding a place where they could all their own and  live without the annoyances of the other.

Up in the hills, the lion caught wind of the new arrangements and decided to wander down into the pasture to see what was happening for himself. Sure enough, the four oxen had split and, now, each one ruled over their own little pasture. Which meant that the lion was now free to attack them one by one. Which he did, and soon it was only the lion left standing. The four oxen, once invincible, had been defeated by their own bickering.

It is funny how often the end appears because of our disagreements. The end of the Assyrian Empire began with a civil war that followed the death of Ashurbanipal in 627 B.C.E. Suddenly, the great war machine that had terrorized the nations was turned inward on itself, as one faction tried to lead the empire over the desires of another. The war was brutal, and one by one those areas who had been defeated by the Assyrians one again began to assert their independence. And without a united front, the Assyrian Empire just didn’t have the power to do anything about it.

Assyria did fight back, but after a few initial wins all of those who had been on the receiving end of Assyria’s military might unified for one final push to the capital city, Nineveh. The capital city fell in 609 B.C.E. and the Assyrian Empire disappeared into the pages of history.

In a strange twist of fate, Nabonidus grabbed power of the Babylonian Empire in 556 B.C.E. Nabonidus was an Assyrian from Harran. But Nabonidus, who would be the last king of the Babylonian Empire, made no effort to rebuild the Assyrian Empire. There really wasn’t a point. Less than 100 years after this prophecy of Nahum, there was nothing left of Nineveh but ruins, and precious few Assyrians even lived in the area.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Nahum 3