Page:03.BCOT.KD.HistoricalBooks.B.vol.3.LaterProphets.djvu/869

 see the remark on Jos 1:1. Even when no express reference to any preceding occurrence takes place, the historian still puts what he has to relate in connection with other historical occurrences by an “and it came to pass.” Ahashverosh is, as has already been remarked on Ezra 4, Xerxes, the son of Darius Hystaspis. Not only does the name אחשׁורושׁ point to the Old-Persian name Ks'ayars'a (with א prosthetic), but the statements also concerning the extent of the kingdom (Est 1:1; Est 10:1), the manners and customs of the country and court, the capricious and tyrannical character of Ahashverosh, and the historical allusions are suitable only and completely to Xerxes, so that, after the discussions of Justi in Eichhorn's Repert. xv. pp. 3-38, and Baumgarten, de fide, etc., pp. 122-151, no further doubt on the subject can exist. As an historical background to the occurrences to be delineated, the wide extent of the kingdom ruled by the monarch just named is next described: “He is that Ahashverosh who reigned from India to Ethiopia over 127 provinces.” מדינה ... שׁבע is not an accusative dependent on מלך, he ruled 127 provinces, for מלך, to reign, is construed with על or בּ, but is annexed in the form of a free apposition to the statement: “from India to Cush;” as also in Est 8:9. הדּוּ is in the Old-Persian cuneiform inscriptions, Hidhu; in Zend, Hendu; in Sanscrit, Sindhu, i.e., dwellers on the Indus, for Sindhu means in Sanscrit the river Indus; comp. Roediger in Gesenius, Thes. Append. p. 83, and Lassen, Indische Alterthumsk. i. p. 2. כּוּשׁ is Ethiopia. This was the extent of the Persian empire under Xerxes. Mardonius in Herod. 7:9 names not only the Sakers and Assyrians, but also the Indians and Ethiopians as nations subject to Xerxes. Comp. also Herod. 7:97, 98, and 8:65, 69, where the Ethiopians and Indians are reckoned among the races who paid tribute to the Persian king and fought in the army of Xerxes. The 127 מדינות, provinces, are governmental districts, presided over, according to Est 8:9, by satraps, pechahs, and rulers. This statement recalls that made in Dan 6:2, that Darius the Mede set over his kingdom 120 satraps. We have already shown