THE RESCUE OF JERUSALEM: The Alliance Between Hebrews and Africans in 701 B.C.

In 701 B.C., the Assyrian army was poised at the gates of Jerusalem—and yet the city escaped annihilation. According to the Old Testament, Yahweh brought about the city's deliverance; scholars of ancient history have speculated that the city's surrender, or an epidemic, was the reason for the sudden Assyrian departure. Aubin examines this mysterious evacuation—"one of history's great puzzles"—in his well-researched though sometimes highly speculative account. Jerusalem, Aubin argues, was saved by Taharqa, a Kushite/Egyptian pharaoh of the 25th dynasty, and his Kushite army of black African soldiers. The Kushites made up a powerful, prosperous semiautonomous kingdom in what is now known as Nubia. According to Aubin's theory, the pharaoh made common cause with the Hebrews against the Assyrians—the bullies of the ancient Near East—and drove them from the region. But owing to the racism that the European colonization of Africa engendered, the importance of the Kushite legacy has been ignored. Aubin's examination of evidence is exhaustive, which at times makes for an arduous read: the narrative is dense and the endnotes comprehensive. But Aubin may offer the best solution to a biblical problem that has long troubled scholars, and his volume is an important reexamination of an event that ensured the survival of the Hebrew people (and therefore, the emergence of the Jewish faith and its "two principle offshoots, Christianity and Islam"). Aubin, a journalist, offers a book that will have wide appeal for professionals interested in the ancient Near East and readers for whom biblical events of historical significance are an enduring interest. (May)