Matthew Stuckey here and I wanted to make a quick video on three myths of ancient Assyria.
Three myths of ancient Assyria. Now the truth is that little is really known about ancient Assyria.
In fact when you read online and you read various sources they're gonna tell you that there's just
a dearth or a lack of many sources regarding Assyria so they're really not sure about a lot
of the finer details. Now when when you're a Bible believing Christian this makes sense because God
destroyed Nineveh. Assyria was so wicked that they were destroyed and the result is that we just
don't have a lot of the archaeological remains that you have from other locations. A lot of
things have just kind of passed away and there's not a whole lot of knowledge. So the truth is the
best source of knowledge regarding ancient Assyria is no question in the Bible. Now obviously the
Bible is 100% accurate and it's always a great source of information but especially in the case
of Assyria there's just not a lot of information outside of what the Bible says rather than little
pieces here and there that you got to piece together and try to figure out you know what's
accurate what's true what's not. So three myths of ancient Assyria. And myth number one is that
ancient Assyria was a polytheistic empire. Myth number one is that they were a polytheistic empire
and when I say that they were not polytheistic when I say that's a myth I'm saying that they
were not classically polytheistic as you might think of it as. And so I want you to realize when
they looked at the view of God and Asher was a name of their primary or head or true God and
basically they looked at all the gods lowercase G as basically making up the one true God almost
kind of like a oneness view on it not quite but it's like a morphed idea on monotheism. But they
believed in Asher as being the true God and what they specifically as an empire looked at was that
all of these lower gods were basically like powers of the one true God. So Asher was the one true
God and then all these lower gods kind of represented his power. It was kind of a way
that they were able to manage or come to grasp on the the nature and idea of God. In their texts
sometimes you'll see Asher and the great gods and it makes a distinction between Asher being the
true God and it makes a distinction with these other gods that are here. Now you might say well
that sounds like they're polytheistic because it says Asher and the great gods as if there's
different co-eternal gods that were competing against one another and that were all all powerful
or omniscient and things such as that. But I want you to think of you know Roman Catholicism to
understand this idea because if the Bible were being written today and it were to talk about
the Roman Catholic Church it would call the Saints as gods I believe. Because in other religions and
philosophical belief systems and cultures and stuff like that the way that Catholics
treat their Saints is the exact same way that other people treat as gods. They just call it
something different and so it'd be no different than the fact that the Catholics believe in one
God. No doubt that they're monotheistic and yet the way that they pray to Saints and they have
idols it's as if they're polytheistic. And obviously that's because it comes from the
Roman Empire and they merged Roman Catholicism and Christianity with the Roman Empire and all
those pagan gods. But I want you to realize that Catholics actually do believe in one God
but when you look at the Saints it's as if they believe in multiple gods. It's actually that way
for a lot of ancient civilizations and a lot of cultures that we would have considered being
polytheistic. They're not really polytheistic in the way that you really think. In fact,
most of them almost all of them were monotheistic. And this is definitely true with the ancient
Assyrian Empire where they would look at these lower gods as just being kind of representations
or parts of the power of the one true God of Asher. And so you know it says with Asher that
he was a source of all manifest divine powers and so basically all these powers are coming
directly from Asher. And there's this statement written in a lot of you know ancient Assyrian
texts where it says, Gabulilani Asher which is the sum of all gods. So basically you know Asher was
kind of like a summation of all of these gods put together. Obviously as a Bible believing Christian
this is different than what the Bible says. I'm not saying I believe this. I'm not saying
when they were you know kind of a morph monotheistic view that it's the same monotheism
that we believe. But it's also not a classical polytheistic view as if that there's multiple
eternal fighting powers that are against one another and that are all omniscient or all
powerful. It's a different idea than what the Bible says about there being one God but also
believing in the Trinity as Bible believing Christians. But myth number one about the
ancient Assyrians is that they were polytheistic. They weren't really polytheistic and so they
really believed that they had the one true God. And when they took over and won battles
versus other ones it doesn't mean that they believe that there was another God that was
like equally also a fight against them. They were basically saying this proves that we are the true
power and that Asher is the one true God. Myth number two about ancient Assyria is that they
were not that powerful. And so I want you to realize that in our modern day aside from the
Bible the general view in the secular world is that Assyria just wasn't really that powerful.
Not really a whole lot is known about them since they got wiped out. When you look in the Bible
though it talks about how during the end times there's gonna be this seventh end times power.
Seventh end times world power indicating six came before. We understand what four of those were from
Nebuchadnezzar and his dream. We understand the Babylonian Empire. We understand the Persian and
the Medes put together. The Medo and Persian Empire. We understand the Greek Empire and then
we understand the Roman Empire. Those four are known but before that there was two great empires
that existed and those were Egypt and Assyria. What's funny is you look at these other six and
you consider them very powerful. Egypt obviously so much is known about them. So powerful. I mean
obviously we're aware of that and everybody in the secular world is aware of that. You know the
Roman Empire obviously they were in power at the time of Jesus Christ. Julius Caesar everybody
knows who he is. Many of the Egyptian Pharaohs people know them King Tut and other ones like
that. The Greek Empire or Macedonian Empire with Alexander the Great a lot is obviously known about
them. You look at the Babylonian Empire and King Nebuchadnezzar a lot is known about them. Everybody
knows that they're powerful. Then you've got the Persians and they've got a lot of the most famous
kings that have ever existed. King Cyrus, King Darius, King Xerxes. A lot is known about them
and it's known that they were very powerful and yet when it comes to the Assyrians nobody
unless you're a Bible believing Christian really knows any of their kings that have ever existed.
It's kind of like they're just completely done away and you you wouldn't even realize that they
were that powerful. And yet the Bible lists them as one of the six big powers. In fact in the book
of Nahum chapter 3 when it talks about the destruction that's coming to Nineveh which was
the chief city or capital of Assyria. You know Assyria had developed this attitude inside of
them that no one could take them down and then God basically told them that you're not better
than Egypt. Egypt's power was infinite. So I believe we're gonna take that literally. It at least
means that Assyria was not more powerful than Egypt. I personally take it to mean that Egypt
was a little bit more powerful than Assyria but it does list Assyria in the same sort of ballpark
with those other empires throughout the Bible. So Assyria was actually very powerful and you know
honestly they deserve to be known as one of the most powerful empires that have ever existed. Now
you say why is it that you know it's not known how powerful they are? That actually goes to the
third myth that we're talking about. So myth one was that the ancient Assyrians were polytheistic.
Not really true. Myth number two is that they were not that powerful. In a secular world not
that much is really known about them. That's not actually true. If you read the Bible you can tell
they were very powerful. And they're starting to find this out from archaeological evidence. It's
amazing how history and science and everything ends up catching up to the Bible. Myth number
three is Assyria was not that evil. And so the reason why not much is known about Assyria there's
very little that remains and people don't even realize how powerful they were is because Assyria
was so wicked that God destroyed Nineveh. Now this is pretty amazing because Egypt was wicked. Rome
was wicked right? The Roman Empire, the Greek Empire, the Grecians they were wicked. And yet
these societies were not just completely destroyed by God and yet Nineveh was completely destroyed
because they were so incredibly wicked. And so because of the the fact they were so wicked it's
not even known that they were that powerful. But in our modern day when they talk about Assyria
they'll try to say well Assyria wasn't that wicked. Cultures are just kind of different and
everything like that. You know it's a misrepresentation. And yet the Bibles are best source
of information on Assyria and it's completely accurate. And when you read about Assyria there
is no question they are the most evil of those empires that I've mentioned. And it's not even
close. They are by far the most evil and it makes sense that God would destroy them. Now I want you
to realize this is not a criticism of anybody that has that you know lineage today that passes
down from thousands of years ago. That has nothing to do with you. And obviously you know people that
are modern day you know Assyrians have you know completely different religious system. It's more
like an Orthodox type belief and stuff like that. I'm not saying this is you today but but the truth
is the truth and that is that the ancient Assyrians were incredibly wicked. And so one proof of that
is the fact that Nineveh was destroyed. And you know when you're reading about Assyria in the
Bible you're seeing how they're mocking other gods and saying they're the one true one. And
the wicked things that they're gonna do to Israel when they take over you can see how wicked they
are. And you know it's funny because I actually preached about this a little bit in a sermon and
somebody was visiting our church and he said everything you said about Assyria is true.
Because he said he went to a museum in London that had a lot of archaeological remains on Assyria.
And Assyria in their own artwork in their own sculptures and artwork they depict themselves
as brutally torturing their enemies. Cutting out their tongues and doing all these brutal and
violent things. Not just killing but just brutally torturing their enemies. And so look if you if you
want to know a lot about a society look at look at their own sculptures and and how they depict
themselves. And they depicted themselves as being incredibly wicked. There's no question there they
were wicked and obviously God did the right thing when he decided to completely destroy them. Now
from what I understand what I would say is the best reason why they became so much more wicked
than anybody else is that their view of God was that God really you know really loved war and
their God was like a god of war. And so he took glory in the fact if you would brutally kill and
destroy and conquer and things such as that. I'm hesitant to say that dogmatically because honestly
there's just little evidence of the remains of Assyria. So I think it's up for some some debate
or speculation and you know maybe my opinion will change if I read more sources. It's really
difficult because not only are there a few sources but the only way for me to have an
understanding of this is read things that are translated into English. And you know when things
are translated depending on who's translating it it kind of depends on you know what they're
gonna bring to the table. Whether they're gonna give a slanted view or an accurate view it's kind
of hard to tell. But one thing I do know from reading the Bible and from studying ancient
Assyria is this that no doubt number one they were not really classically polytheistic. They
were actually more of a monotheistic or morphed monotheistic view. Number two though there is no
question especially just straight from the Bible that they were very powerful. One of the most
powerful empires that have ever existed. And myth number three you know is the fact that they
weren't that evil. They were actually very powerful. They're actually very evil. And the
fact that they were very evil is the exact reason why God decided to destroy Assyria. Thank you and
God bless.