Peep (Hastings' Dictionary)

To peep in Is 8 10 (nyc35, Pilp. ptep. of nex; LXX xevodoyeiv, ἀντειπεῖν) is not to chirp (as RV), but to cheep, ie. it expresses not the cheerful contented note of little birds, but the feeble cry of nestlings. It is an imitative word, | ΓΞ 736 PEKAH and is used also of a mouse’s cry, as Purchas, Pilgrimage, 357, ‘ Hee procuring such peace in the East (saith Vopiscus) that a rebellious Mouse was not heard to peepe.’ In Sir 2153 ‘ peep’ is used in its mod.

sense, ‘A fool will peep in at the door into the house’ (παρακύπτει: cf. Jn 20°, 1 P 113), So Jer 6! Cov. ‘A plage and a greate ee pepeth out from the North.’ J. HAsTINGs. PEKAH (nao, LXX Φάκεε, Assyr. Pakahu) was the son of Remaliah. The name in full form was robably 17:79, the same as that of his predecessor. ΠΣ the current OT significations of the verb npp, the name would my either (a) ‘Jehovah hath beheld (lit.

opened his he upon) (me)’; see 2 Καὶ 455 19'8, Jer 32", Zec 124, Job 14%, and οὗ, xy mat and Assyr. proper name Bilimurani, ‘Bel hath beheld me’; or (4) far more probably ‘Jehovah hath opened (my eyes)’; cf. Gn 21”, 2K 617: The omission of the Divine name as subject is illustrated in the case of Ahaz (=Ahaziah), Nathan (=Nethaniah, El-Nathan), which stands for }2 77 }n} ; ef.

Marduk-apla-iddin(a) and other Assyrian parallels which further ex- emplify the omission of the object in the ab- breviated form of the proper name. See the illus- trations which have been collected in Schrader, COT ii. p. 326, by the present writer. Pekah, son of Remaliah, was of obscure parent- age, to which Isaiah refers with a touch of satire (7. The story of his brief but important reign is told in the short extract 2 Καὶ 15°".

Twenty years are ascribed to him, but chronological con- siderations based on the data of the Assyrian annalistic inscriptions, and the Canon of Rulers, can assign him a reign of only about three years (736-733). Comp. Schrader, COT ii. p- 321 ff., and art. CHRONOLOGY OF THE OT in vol. 1. p. 401 f. Pekah was captain of Pekahiah’s Gileadite body- guard, and held the important confidential post of Shalish* near the king’s person.

This gave him unusual opportunities, when with fifty chosen men he compassed the destruction of king Pekahiah. We are left in entire ignorance as to the circum- stances which led to this violent act (2 K 15”), and the text is, moreovwr, far from certain.t All that we definitely know is that it took place at Samaria, probably in the stronghold of the royal palace.

t It is possible, however, in the light of subsequent as well as preceding events, to frame an adequate theory for the motives of state policy which under- lay Pekah’s conspiracy. The history of Israel and Judah from the days of the disruption downwards was largely deter- mined by the lines of foreign policy. While Syria was the most formidable foe, and Egypt remained quiescent, the problems of this policy were not complex.

Resistance or unwilling submission to Syria was the keynote of Israel’s foreign policy in the reigns of Baasha, Omri, and Ahab. But in the reign of the last-mentioned monarch the formidable power of Aram (Syria) was dwarfed ty the rising might of Assyria awakening from its slumber of centuries (see art. AHAB). In the reign of the Assyrian king Ramman-nirfri I. the power of Syria was broken, never more to recover its former vitality.

From this time forth the chief menace to the security of all the Palestinian states was the advancing (though occasionally quiescent) power of Assyria. Now, just as Napoleon 1. in * See art. ‘Chariot’ in this Dict. and in Encycl. Bibl., and algo ‘ Army.’ ἡ Cf. Stade, Gesch. i. p. 588, n. 1. t We have no alternative but to follow the MT at this point ; UXX ἐναντίον οἴκου is an obvious corruption of the text εἰς ἄντρον ἔχου. Of.

the closely parallel 1 K 1618, Klostermann in place of 32) 339% ΠΝ would read 1733 NRD Y27¥ Ny, evidently based on the LXX ava τῶν τιτρακυσίων and O43 ΒΦ of the Heb. text in the latter part of She verse. PEKAH | his career of conquest (like the kings of Franca who preceded him) profited by a disunited Germany and a disunited Italy, so the successive monarchs who reigned in Nineveh reaped an abundant harvest from the divided and too often mutually hostile policies of the Palestinian states.

Onl for a brief period near the close of his career di Ahab pursue the only intelligent principle of self- preservation against the pent (which was then some- what distant from Israel), viz. alliance with Syria against the Assyrian foe.

This sound course of action was abandoned at the close of Ahab’s life, as the result of a humiliating defeat at the hands of Assyria; and the fatal and short-sighted policy of selfish isolation, and even of compliance by means of tribute to the Assyrian pawets was pur- sued in succession by Jehu, in al petites a! Jeroboam I1., and also, as we know definitely from both Assyrian and Hebrew records, by Menahem.

Pekah and his contemporary Rezin,* king of Syria, had the intelligence to perceive that it was only through a common policy pursued by the allied Palestinian states that the formidable power of Tiglath-pileser ΠῚ. could be checked. Accord- ingly we may regard it as probable that the insurrection against the son of Menahem was sus- tained by the deep discontent aroused by his con- tinuance of his father’s policy of subservience and tributary vassalage to Assyria.

Whether this insurrection was fomented by an Egyptian Party, as Kittel+ supposes, we consider very doubtful. For Egypt at that time (viz. the close of the 23rd and the brief 24th dynasty) was hardly in a position to give any practical support to the patriotic oP ponents of Assyria.t Six years later, during the strong rule of the Ethiopian Sabaco (Shabaka), Egypt rose into a position of much greater strength, and endeavoured to control the course of Western Asian politics.

Two parties then arose in Ephraim as well as in Judah which favoured the claims re- spectively of Assyria and of Egypt. See HOSHEA, Jotham was the monarch who reigned in Judah at the time when the alliance was concluded between Pekah king of Ephraim and Rezin of Damascus against Assyria. We read nothing of overtures made to Jotham to join this confederacy. It is not improbable, however, that they were made.

Jotham, as we may certainly suppose, declined to join the alliance, deeming the policy of neutrality to be safest. Accordingly the armies of Damascus and Samaria were united against Judah in order to coerce the latter into compli- ance. In the midst of the campaign Jotham died, and was succeeded by the youthful Ahaz. By this time, if not before, Philistia had joined the corli- tion.

Pekah, during the reign of Ahaz, assumed the offensive, and moved witinlite army against tie capital of Judah itself. Meanwhile his ally, Reziu, was carrying on operations in the east and south- east of Judah, in the trans-Jordanie country. Elath, the port in the Red Sea, a valuable outlet for the commerce which passed into and from the Red Sea, was wrested from Ahaz by the successful arms of Rezin (2 Καὶ 16°). See art. ELATH.

Jerusalem was now closely invested by the beleaguering force of the Ephraimites. 2Ch 2861} containing a beautiful episode in which the prophet Oded plays a conspicuous part, but containing also characteristic exaggerations of numerical detail, must be placed in a secondary rank of historic record. The graphic scene described in Is 7 need not detain us, as it properly belongs to the reign of Ahaz (see AHAZ). It was proposed by the hostile * LXX 'Ραασσών and Assyr.

Ragunnu clearly indicate that ΠῚ is the true and original form of the name (signifying ‘good pleasure,’ ‘ grace,’ or ‘ favour’). 1 Geach. der Hebrier. ii. 236 (Eng. tr. il. 888]. g t Comp. Meyer, Gesch. alten tens, p. 343; McCurdy HPM i 337.) ee coalition to place ἃ son οἵ TAb-él on the throne of Judah. 'Lhe parallelism with ben Remaliah would lead us to suppose (1) that Rezin (or perhaps his brother) is meant, and (2) that Tab-él was an obscure personage. Winckler (Alttest. Unters.

pp- 73-76) considers that Tab-él (=Tab-Ramman) rei, in ed in Damascus c. 773-740. The Judean king in his extremity paid no heed to Isaiah’s inspirit- ing counsels ‘not to fear nor let his heart be soft because of the two stumps of smoking firebrands, Rezin and the son of Remaliah,’ but despatched envoys to Tiglath-pileser tendering abject sub- mission, and conveying a rich tribute in money. The Assyrian monarch soon turned his conquering Peas towards the Palestinian states (B.C. 734).

is heavy hand was first felt by Damascus. Rezin was overpowered, and lost his life. For Israel the results were overwhelming and disastrous. The kingdom was shorn of its northern and trans- Jordanic(?) provinces. Isaiah, with that marvellous literary power of description, * With hue like that when some t ter dij His pencil in the gloom of Gia ena eclipeey? adel for us in graphic and lurid touches the onward march of those marshalled hosts of Tiglath-pileser’s army of invasion.

‘Behold, hastily, swiftly he cometh. There is none that is weary orstumbleth. He stumbleth not nor sleepeth. The paue of his loins is never loosed, nor the thong of is sandals rent—whose arrows are sharp, and all his bows bent ; whose horses’ hoofs are accounted as flint, and his wheels like the whirlwind. His roar is like that of the lioness; he roareth like the young lions, moaning and catching the prey and carrying it off safe, and there is none to rescue.

And at that time there is moaning over it like the moaning of the sea; and if one looketh to the earth, behold, oppressive darkness |!’ (Is 5%-), n the annals of Tiglath-pileser we read the fol- lowing brief details from a seriously mutilated in- scription:+—‘ The town Gilfead] . . Abel [Maacha] which are above the land Beth Omri (Samaria) . . the broad, I smote in its entire extent into the territory of Assyria, and placed my officers as viceroys over them.

t Hanno of Gaza, who had taken to flight in fear of my weapons, fled into the land of Egypt. Gaza I captured ; its possessions, its gods I carried away captive... The land Beth Omri (Samaria), the whole of its inhabitants, together with their booty, I carried off to Tie τὸ Pekah their king, I slew. Hoshea (Ausi) I ap- pointed as ruler over them.’ So perished ‘like a chip on the water’s surface’ Hos 107) another ill-fated king of Ephraim.

The euteronomic redactor paints him in the dark and monotonous hues of the long line of Jeroboam ben Nebat’s successors. This may be interpreted to mean that he was tolerant of the religious condi- tions which prevailed during the middle of the 8th cent. The numerous high places or baméth, where Jehovah was worshipped, fostered modes of cultus which closely approximated to those of the Canaanite baalim.

The oracles of the prophet Hosea, which clearly belong to the Ephraimite kingdom, vividly depict the disorders that pre- * This was probably written by the prophet as a reminiscence of what he had actually experienced by personal observation or learned from eye-witnesses of the events of πιο, 734. The date of the oracle is probably 8.0. 726. See article Hosuma, and foot- note ἡ, p. 426 in vol. ii. ἡ Schrader, KIB il. p. 80. t The towns lyyon, Abel-beth-Maacah, Kadesh, and Janoah (2 K 15, cf.

1 K 1639 91!) appear to have all belonged to Galilee and Naphtali. Janoah is evidently α different place from that of the same name in Jos 1086, Kittel identifies it with Jenoam Jenwamu of the Egyptian records; see Miller, Asien τ, ropa, p. 394), an Israelite frontier town towards Tyre. Benzinger would delete Gilead from the text {perbeps ditto- graphy). ΠῚ Rawl. 10. 2, lines 17 foll. . th (mabAzu) Ga-al « +» (A)}-bi-il is all we have to guide us. VOL. I1t.

—a7 vailed during the reign of Pekah. Chapters 4 and also 6 and 7 present a lurid picture of the social evils of the time. Gilead, we are told, ‘is a cit of them that work iniquity, it is tracked with blood-stains. As robber bands lie in wait for a man, so the company of priests murder on the way to Shechem’ (6%), In ch. 4 the prophet rebukes the lying and stealing, the murder and bloodshed, while among all classes of society the grossest forms of sensuality and superstition prevailed (vy.)

18) ; see article HosEa. Winckler (Gesch, Isr. pp. 92-95) would place the latter part of the prophetic activity of Amos as late as the reign of Pekah on account of the re- ferences to the dismemberment of Israel in 3%. thle ΤΌΣΕΣ. read ex in place of mex in νῦ. erhaps, however, it is not n to bring his oracles down to a later date than ΒΟ. 738, Ε ΟΥΕΝ C. WHITEHOUSE.